Victims sought for lawsuits against Meta: Ads on Instagram & Co. blocked
Two rulings in the US could trigger new lawsuits against Meta. Lawyers are seeking clients for this – including on Instagram & Co. Meta is now preventing this.
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The US company Meta is removing advertising from law firms on Instagram and Facebook, among other platforms, which they used to search for individuals intending to sue these platforms. This was discovered by the US magazine Axios and later confirmed by Meta. The law firms were hoping to find numerous new clients who accuse Meta of harming them through the design of its social networks and could therefore receive lucrative damages. With the advertisements, the law firms were reacting to two highly anticipated court cases in the USA, which concluded with decisions holding the social network operators liable for damages to users.
Meta's Resistance
According to Axios, law firms across the USA are searching for people who believe they have been harmed by social networks. These individuals could demand high damages in court, from which the law firms would also profit. The US magazine had found more than a dozen deactivated advertisements targeting such individuals. They stated, for example, that platforms like Meta's were aware of the dangers. Meta reportedly cited its own terms of service for the deletion, explaining that the ads could have negative legal consequences for the company. "We will not allow trial lawyers to profit from our platforms while simultaneously claiming they are harmful," Reuters quotes the company spokesperson.
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The landmark lawsuits concluded at the end of March in the US states of California and New Mexico, with potentially far-reaching consequences. In Los Angeles, Meta and Google were ordered to pay six million US dollars in damages, a decision that could prove to be a precedent for thousands of similar cases against tech companies. In New Mexico, a jury concurrently imposed a fine of 375 million US dollars on Meta, accusing the Facebook and Instagram company of knowingly endangering children's health. Here too, this is likely just the beginning of numerous further rulings. Law firms are seeking clients for similar decisions, but no longer on Instagram & Co. for now.
(mho)
