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canopic jug [soylentnews.org] writes:

Multiple sites are reporting that the public school district in Seattle, Washington, is suing a few of the more infamous technology giants over the negative effect they have on the mental health of its students.

Plaintiff:

Seattle School District No 1

Defendant:

Meta Platforms, Inc., Facebook Holdings, LLC, Facebook Operations, LLC, Meta Payments Inc., Facebook Technologies, LLC, Instagram, LLC, Siculus, Inc., Snap Inc., TikTok Inc., ByteDance Inc., Alphabet Inc., Google LLC, XXVI Holdings Inc. and YouTube, LLC

Case Number:

2:2023cv00032

Filed:

January 6, 2023

Court:

US District Court for the Western District of Washington

Nature of Suit:

Torts to Land

Cause of Action:

28 U.S.C. § 1332 Diversity

Jury Demanded By:

Plaintiff

Covered at:

• Seattle Public Schools sues TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and others, seeking compensation for youth mental health crisis [geekwire.com]. GeekWire
• Seattle schools sue tech giants over social media harm [independent.co.uk]. The Independent
• Seattle Schools Sue Tech Giants Over Social ... [usnews.com]. US News
• Seattle's schools are suing tech giants for harming young people's mental health [npr.org]. NPR
• Seattle Schools sues social media firms over youth mental health crisis [columbian.com]. The Columbian
• Seattle Schools sues social media firms over youth mental health crisis [seattletimes.com]. The Seattle Times
• Seattle schools sue tech giants over social media harm [go.com]. ABC News
• Seattle Public Schools sues social media giants for youth mental health crisis [cascadiadaily.com]. Cascadia Daily News
• .

ByteDance and its service TikTok have been covered a lot here at SN though mostly only from the privacy problems it presents, rather than its harms to health.

The actual court docket [justia.com] is blocked behind PACER's paywall. However, Justia Dockets and Filings [justia.com] has a brief summary of the plaintiff and defendants. One of the largest stressors of all age groups, and a major regional political presence there, Microsoft (aka M$, MSFT, Microshaft, Billysoft, Micro$oft, Microsludge, The Seattle Mafia, The Beast in Redmond, etc) seems to have evaded being named in this case, so far. Nor was there mention of the negative effects on physical health.

Original Submission