Addiction, self-harm, suicide: Social media's engagement-driven strategy is under intense scrutiny for allegedly engineering compulsive use and severe psychological harm, especially in children.
Platforms like Facebook, YouTube and TikTok make huge profits by keeping users hooked via nonstop scrolling, recommendations and constant notifications.
Facebook owner Meta, for example, generated a record $196.2 billion (€168.3 billion) in advertising revenue last year, driven by its ability to keep people glued to their screens.
That business model is now facing major legal and regulatory roadblocks, with social media bans for people younger than 16 spreading globally and a growing wave of lawsuits, mainly in the United States.
In the latest major case, 29 states, including California, Colorado and New Jersey, sued Meta earlier this month, alleging that the social media giant designed its platforms to addict young users.
