In the span of just 48 hours this week, two separate juries in two different US states delivered verdicts that could reshape the entire social media industry — not because of the dollar amounts involved, but because of what those verdicts legally establish for the first time. On Tuesday, March 24, a jury in Santa Fe, New Mexico ordered Meta to pay $375 million for failing to protect children from sexual exploitation on Facebook and Instagram. Less than 24 hours later, on Wednesday, March 25, a jury in Los Angeles found both Meta and Google (YouTube) liable for engineering addiction in young users — finding them negligent in the design of their platforms and awarding a further $6 million in damages. Two days. Two states. Two juries. Both pointing at the same conclusion: that Big Tech can no longer hide behind the legal shields it has relied on for nearly three decades. This is the story of what happened, why it matters far beyond the headline numbers, and what comes next for the s...
Image Credit: DigitialTrends After the SOPA fiasco where the internet stood still for a day the US congress now wants to push ahead with a bill Called CISPA (Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act). This bill like SOPA is causing quiet a stir online. With techdirt stating that 'With this bill the Government is saying that the 4th amendment does not exist for people online. And as long as the US Government can claim that an individual committed a cyber security crime they can do whatever they want with information collected from an someone's online activity. In a Q&A article Cnet goes on to describe this bill as a way for the US government to spy on its own citizens. it would give the Gov the right to monitor Social Networks and more than that even Internet Service providers. Which would essentially give them the power to monitor all activity of everyone online in the US. The national.ae also goes on to report that the bill has the support of Facebook and Goog...