New Social Media Company Documents Revealed as Case Nears Trial

Several internal documents displayed for the first time in open court Tuesday show social media companies discussing negative links between their platforms and users’ mental health.

The new information builds on a trove of internal documents that have already been publicized in news reports and lawsuits, describing the companies’ strategies to keep users returning to their platforms. It comes comes as initial trials approach in a massive set of cases claiming tech giants designed their platforms to addict children.

Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl allowed plaintiffs’ lawyers to share images of and information from the documents at the Tuesday summary judgment hearing.

YouTube documents presented in court said users who watch videos to quickly boost their moods can become addicted. Beauty filters on photos can worsen body dissatisfaction, according to Meta documents, which is linked to eating disorders and other health problems.

TikTok’s design reduces user agency and produce a “slot machine effect,” its documents say. And Snap’s “streaks” feature tracking the number of days users exchange messages is connected, its documents say, to compulsive use of the app.

Lawyers for the tech companies objected repeatedly to Kuhl allowing the documents before her full ruling on their motion to seal.

The negative effects described in the records are “the exact type of harm that K.G.M. claims to have experienced from these features,” said Beasley Allen’s Joseph VanZandt said, arguing on behalf of the first plaintiff, whose trial is scheduled to begin in late January.

Content-based

The social media companies are asking Kuhl to resolve the first set of three “bellwether” cases before they go to trial.

They reprise an argument they’ve made throughout the case’s yearslong pendency—this time, armed with discovery—that the plaintiffs’ claims are barred because they allege harm based on content posted to the apps, and are unable to show that the way they’re designed directly causes users’ problems.

Kuhl’s decision on whether to resolve the three cases before trial will have an impact on proceedings and settlements for the hundreds of cases set to follow them.

Ashley Simonsen of Covington & Burling LLP said for Meta that the “gravamen” of K.G.M.'s claims about its platform design are either barred by Section 230, the federal shield against lawsuits based on third-party content posted online, or by the First Amendment, as Meta’s expressive activity.

“Facebook also has notifications and endless scroll,” Simonsen said. “But the plaintiff isn’t addicted to Facebook, because she isn’t addicted to its content.”

Counsel for Snap also argued that the second bellwether plaintiff, R.K.C., should not be able to proceed to trial because user data shows he has only used accounts associated with his phone number for less than four minutes, ever.

R.K.C.'s attorneys disputed the data, saying R.K.C. likely had other accounts.

Expertise

Kuhl throughout the hearing—continuing an inquiry from a September hearing on the admissibility of experts—asked whether she has authority to allow lay people to testify that social media caused their mental health problems. Lawyers for the companies have argued that the plaintiffs aren’t presenting sufficient evidence of causation.

Kuhl in September allowed all but one of eleven proposed doctors and researchers to present at trial, but barred them from discussing the companies’ intentions.

Simonsen said the medical cause of a physical injury must be discerned by an expert.

“What’s the dividing line here?” Kuhl said. “If you are emotionally distressed but you don’t go to a medical professional, versus you do go to a medical professional? How do we make a distinction?”

Later in the hearing, Simonsen said to Kuhl that an order finding non-experts can testify on medical causation would be a reversible error.

“I remember when I stood in this court and argued” to a prior judge “that he was about to make reversible error,” Kuhl said. “He didn’t like it.”

The case is Social Media Cases JCCP, Cal. Super. Ct., No. JCCP5255, 10/28/25.