• by Wendy Davis , Yesterday

Siding against Meta Platforms and TikTok, a federal appellate court on Monday refused to halt litigation by 29 state attorneys general who accuse the companies of designing their services to "addict" teens.

The ruling, issued by a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, comes two days before the attorneys general are expected to face off against Meta at a jury trial in Oakland, California.

Monday's ruling stems from a battle that began in 2024, when attorneys general sued Meta and other tech platforms in federal court for allegedly violating state consumer protection laws.

The states' complaints included allegations that Meta wrongly touted its services as safe for teens, and injured teens by using supposedly "addictive" design features -- such as recommendations and videos that play automatically -- and then serving minors with potentially harmful material, like filtered photos that promote unrealistic beauty standards.

Meta and other companies urged U.S. District Court Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers to dismiss the case at a relatively early stage, arguing that algorithmic recommendations, automatically playing videos, and other features were protected by both Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and the First Amendment.

Section 230 broadly provides that web companies are not liable for content posted by users -- including potentially harmful content.

Rogers found that some of the claims were precluded by Section 230, but allowed others to move forward.

For instance, she threw out claims related to Meta's algorithmic recommendations, but said Section 230 didn't require dismissal of claims relating to Instagram's appearance-altering filters.

Meta -- along with TikTok -- then appealed to the 9th Circuit, arguing that Section 230 requires dismissal of the entire complaint.

Last month, Meta separately asked the 9th Circuit to halt Wednesday's planned trial, arguing the trial shouldn't proceed until the appeal was resolved.

On Monday, the 9th Circuit rejected the appeal, ruling that Meta's and TikTok's argument regarding Section 230 was premature. 

The judges specifically said Meta and TikTok weren't entitled to appeal the ruling regarding Section 230 on an "interlocutory" basis -- meaning before the case had concluded at the district court level.

"Because section 230 merely provides a defense to liability -- not immunity from suit -- we lack appellate jurisdiction to review the district court’s rulings on an interlocutory basis," Circuit Judge Jacqueline Nguyen wrote for the court.

She added that Meta's request to halt Wednesday's planned trial was now moot in light of the dismissal of its appeal.