Social media companies getting large fines for treatment of children and teens; UK House of Lords votes for kid's ban on social media again

 

Meta and Google fined for causing child addiction

The verdict comes after Facebook’s parent company was ordered to pay $375 million for profiting from exposing youngsters to online abuse

Published 26 Mar, 2026 15:45 | Updated 26 Mar, 2026 16:50

©  Getty Images/FG Trade Latin

A jury in California found Alphabet’s Google and Meta liable for $6 million in damages on Wednesday in a landmark lawsuit in which the social media giants were accused of being legally responsible for the addictive design of their platforms.

Major US tech companies have faced increasing scrutiny over child and teen safety over the past decade, a debate that has now moved into courts and state legislatures. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, an organization that tracks state laws, at least 20 states enacted laws on social media usage and children in 2025.

A jury ordered Meta to pay $4.2 million and Google $1.8 million in a lawsuit by a 20-year-old woman identified as Kaley, who said she became addicted to YouTube and Instagram as a minor due to features – such as infinite scrolling – which encourage prolonged engagement. Of the total award, about $3 million is compensation to the plaintiff, while the remainder represents punitive damages.

Both tech giants said they disagree with the ruling, and announced plans to appeal. TikTok and Snap were also named as defendants in the case, but managed to settle before the trial began.

READ MORE: Facebook and Instagram owner enabled child sexual exploitation

On Tuesday, a jury in New Mexico ordered Meta Platforms, which runs Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads, to pay $375 million for knowingly harming children’s mental health and concealing evidence of child sexual exploitation, saying its personalized algorithms could also aid pedophiles.

A separate social media addiction case brought by several states and school districts against major technology companies is expected to go to trial this summer in federal court in Oakland, California. Another state trial is scheduled to begin in July in Los Angeles and will involve Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and Snapchat.

Globally, Meta Platforms faces growing regulatory pressure, having been labeled an “extremist organization” in Russia in 2022 and targeted by multiple European Union actions, including a €797 million ($940 million) antitrust fine and other copyright, data-protection and advertising cases across Europe.

Amid growing concerns over child safety online, countries including Australia, Denmark, France, Spain, Italy, Slovenia, the UK, Indonesia, and Malaysia are restricting or considering limits on social media access for children and teens.

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Britain's House of Lords votes for under-16s social media ban again

By Paul Godfrey

   

Britain's House of Lords voted Thursday to try to force through a social media ban for children only two weeks after lawmakers in the lower house overturned a previous attempt. Photo by Pixelkult/Pixabay

March 26 (UPI) -- Britain's House of Lords revived an effort to ban children younger than 16 from using social media, only two weeks after the House of Commons voted to override a previous bid by the upper chamber of Parliament.

In a 266-141 vote early Thursday, peers backed former Conservative education minister Lord John Nash's amendment to the Labour government's Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill for a second time after MPs defeated it in favor of a 3-month public consultation and bounced the legislation back to the Lords.

"Delay has consequences," Nash said in a statement after the vote.

"Tonight the House of Lords sent for the second time an unambiguous message to the government: hollow promises and half-measures are not enough. That they voted in even greater numbers than before sends a very clear message to the government that they must act now to raise the age limit for access to harmful social media sites to 16," he added.

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British Peer Resigns House of Lords for Using Hookers and Cocaine

Embattled John Sewel says he can best serve 

the upper chamber by leaving it

The Associated Press Posted:

House of Lords member John Sewel has resigned
while police investigate his alleged use of cocaine and prostitutes.
(Suzanne Hubbard/Associated Press)

British lord John Sewel takes leave of absence over alleged cocaine use with prostitutes
A member of the upper chamber of Britain's Parliament resigned on Tuesday, apologizing for causing "pain and embarrassment" after he was filmed allegedly snorting cocaine during sessions with sex workers.

John Sewel — whose title is Lord Sewel — caved in to pressure, telling parliamentary officials he was "terminating my membership of the House of Lords."

"I hope my decision will limit and help repair the damage I have done to an institution I hold dear," said Sewel, who had been chairman of the Lords Privileges and Conduct Committee, responsible for enforcing standards.

Sewel avoids irony of ironies
Less than two weeks previously, Sewel had written an article boasting of how the House of Lords had taken steps to protect its image. He had said only a small number of lords broke the rules and that most understood that personal honour came first.

Sewel, as parliamentary disciplinarian had instituted a system whereby a Lord could be removed from the House for unseemly behaviour. Had he not resigned, he might have become the first casualty of his own rules.

The 69-year-old former academic is at the centre of a political sleaze scandal after The Sun tabloid ran images appearing to show him snorting white powder through a rolled-up banknote and lounging in an orange bra. The paper said the footage was filmed at Sewel's apartment near Parliament.

Police have searched the apartment as part of an investigation sparked by the Sun's claims.

The House of Lords reviews legislation passed by the elected House of Commons, and for most of its 900-year history was composed of hereditary nobles. In recent years members have been appointed for life by the government. There are currently 783 peers — a collection of former lawmakers, lawyers, corporate leaders and other notables with an average age of 70 — and the chamber is often criticized as over-stuffed and out of touch.

Sewel is not the first peer to behave badly. Novelist Jeffrey Archer — Lord Archer of Weston-Super-Mare — was imprisoned for perjury in 2001, while former media baron Conrad Black, or Lord Black of Crossharbour, served prison time in the U.S. after being convicted of fraud in 2007.

This story comes on the heels of the revelation that Lord Bercow, Speaker of the Lower House, made some extraordinary expense claims like charging parliament 172 pounds (over $300) for the trip from home to Westminster - a trip of less than a mile. Lord Bercow has lectured students on the need for probity among lawmakers and helped oversee the introduction of more transparent standards after a devastating parliamentary expenses scandal in 2009. 


With the cover-up of decades of child sex abuse around Westminster -

Irony and hypocrisy loom very large over Westminster 

these days

Janner Wrote to Michael Jackson About Pedophile Charge

Lord Janner wrote to Michael Jackson to congratulate him on being cleared of child sex charges.

The letter from Janner, who last month was deemed unfit to stand trial for 22 child sex abuse charges, was penned on House of Lords paper with his signature clearly visible at the bottom.

It comes days after Scottish police launched a new probe into the former MP for allegedly sexually abusing a teenage boy.

Janner has always denied claims that he was a paedophile and his family say he is innocent of the alleged sex attacks.

The letter was given to Jackson's friend Mark Lester, who starred in the 1968 classic film Oliver! but never passed on to the pop star, according to Ben Griffiths at The Sun on Sunday.

Best wishes: Lord Janner (pictured right) wrote a letter to Michael Jackson
 congratulating him after his acquittal on child sex charges.
 The pair met during a tour of the Houses of Parliament

Dated July 12, 2005, shortly after Jackson was cleared by a US jury of molesting a 13-year-old cancer survivor, Janner wrote: 'I was so very pleased at the news of your acquittal. What a terrible time you have endured.

'I hope that you will return to London and that I should have the pleasure of seeing you once again ... so good luck and all best wishes. Yours, Greville.'

The pair first met when the peer showed the singer round Parliament in 2002.

Mr Lester found the note during a clear-out at his home in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, and says Janner gave it to him during a charity do 10 years ago.

Letter: Lord Janner gave
 the letter to Jackson's friend
Mark Lester (above) who said
 it was 'inappropriate'

Mark, 56, said: 'What he said was inappropriate. No one should congratulate Michael on being cleared let alone a QC and peer. It's as if he's saying, 'Well done, you got away with it'.'

Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders maintains that the peer is too unwell to be prosecuted in England, despite evidence that he may have abused children.

But 78 MPs have so far demanded Mrs Saunders change her decision with veteran Labour MP David Winnick saying Mrs Saunders should be called before the Commons home affairs committee.

The former MP for Leicester voted 203 times in the House of Lords even after he granted power of attorney to his children because of his dementia in 2009.

As Scotland has a separate prosecution system, authorities there could make a decision independently of the CPS review.