Meta Platforms Inc. and Snap Inc. are to blame for the suicide of an 11-year-old who suffered from depression and sleep deprivation after becoming addicted to Instagram and Snapchat, the girl’s mother alleged in a lawsuit.
The woman claims her daughter Selena Rodriguez struggled for two years with an “extreme addiction” to Meta’s photo-sharing platform and Snap’s messaging app before taking her life last year. Instagram and Snapchat have deliberately designed algorithms that keep teens hooked onto their platforms and “promote problematic and excessive use that they know is indicative of addictive and self-destructive use,” according to the lawsuit in San Francisco federal court.
