Attorney General Ford Announces Litigation Against YouTube for Harms Against Nevada Youth

Carson City, NV — Today, Nevada Attorney General Aaron D. Ford announced his office has filed a civil action against social media platform YouTube, as well as its corporate parents Google LLC and Alphabet Inc., for harms that the company has caused to Nevada youth.

Like previous lawsuits the Office of the Attorney General has filed against social media giants Meta, TikTok and Snap, today’s lawsuit alleges that, through deliberate product design choices and public misrepresentations, YouTube has created a highly addictive and harmful platform that it targets directly at Nevada’s youth. These addictive features are alleged to cause and encourage harms like problematic internet usage and addiction; depression, anxiety and negative body image; and harm to children’s physical health and well-being.

"One of the core responsibilities of my office is consumer protection, and there may be no more important consumers than Nevada’s youth,” said AG Ford. “Today’s litigation is a necessary step to ensure that our state’s youth are not exploited by social media platforms and that they can grow into adults without the addictive and harmful impacts that these platforms can cause. I will take every step to protect the children in our great state, and that includes holding accountable those who exploit and harm our youth.”

Like its social media rivals, YouTube’s endlessly scrolling list of videos; algorithmic targeting based on brain chemistry; prioritization of content based on “likes;” constant notifications; disappearing content; and ineffective parental controls are all designed specifically to manipulate young users and keep them on the platform for as long as possible. Like its rivals, YouTube’s core profit center is the advertising it shows to users and the data it collects from them. In 2023 alone, YouTube generated $31.5 billion in revenue, all the while knowingly addicting Nevada’s youth to its product.

This is the most recent action that AG Ford has taken against social media companies in regard to their harmful and destructive effects on Nevada’s youth. In January 2024, the Office of the Attorney General filed civil actions against TikTok, Snapchat and three Meta-owned platforms: Instagram, Facebook and Messenger.

AG Ford’s efforts to bring justice to major social media platforms in Nevada have so far proved successful. The office’s cases against YouTube’s rivals are all proceeding toward trial despite multiple efforts by the companies to dismiss them, with the first trial against Snapchat scheduled to begin in January 2027. AG Ford is looking forward to ensuring yet another social media giant answers for the harms it has caused to Nevada’s children.

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