Taylor Lorenzâs Power User The Media Is Lying About the Social Media Addiction Trial: The Verdict Everyone Got Wrong
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Mar 27, 2026 Kat Tenbarge, journalist who covers tech policy and online culture, explains why headlines got the social media addiction trial wrong. They unpack misleading investigations, identity-check pushers, and how policy fixes can empower big tech and conservative groups. Short, sharp takes on surveillance, censorship risks, and who really benefits from these verdicts.
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Decoy Accounts And Entrapment In New Mexico Case
- New Mexico's AG used fabricated decoy Instagram accounts built with stolen real children's photos to lure predators and then deleted the evidence instead of reporting it.
- The investigation framed harms as platform-driven even though it relied on entrapment and created permanent associations between real kids' images and predators.
Court Testimony Focused On Abuse Not Design
- The LA 'social media addiction' trial centered on Kaylee KGM, whose courtroom testimony focused primarily on severe parental abuse rather than platform design.
- The jury nonetheless attributed her harms to Instagram and found social media addictive, shifting blame from family to platform.
Verdicts May Strengthen Big Tech Power
- Verdicts celebrated as wins against Big Tech actually enable age verification and identity tracking policies that benefit major platforms financially.
- Meta has lobbied for identity verification which increases data harvesting and consolidates platform power.