Trial lawyers hit the digital jackpot — and everyone else pays

Published March 31, 2026 8:00am ET



America is an incredibly litigious society, spending more than $300 billion per year, or nearly $1,000 per person, on tort litigation. Every day, trial lawyers searching for hefty payouts are finding new products to target and new clients to take on. They may have just found the ultimate jackpot: the digital domain.

A Los Angeles jury recently held Meta Platforms and Google’s YouTube liable to the tune of $6 million for allegedly harmful design features, like infinite scrolling and “like” buttons, which made a 20-year-old woman “feel very depressed” and insecure about her looks. 

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