What did Google, Meta and TikTok sue California over?
Google, Meta and TikTok filed separate federal lawsuits on 4 November 2026 asking courts to block California's Assembly Bill 1709. The law, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom on 10 September, limits how covered platforms present content to users under 16. It is scheduled to take effect on 1 January 2027.
The companies did not file a joint case. Google sued in federal court in San Jose, Meta in San Francisco and TikTok in Los Angeles, according to Reuters. Attorney General Rob Bonta, whose office enforces the statute, is the only defendant in all three suits.
The filings seek to stop enforcement of a law that has not yet taken effect. A lawsuit alone does not suspend a statute, so the companies are asking judges to intervene before the January deadline. Bonta's office said on 5 November that it was reviewing the complaints.
The timing is tight. AB 1709 was chaptered as Chapter 183, Statutes of 2026, on 10 September. The complaints arrived less than two months later and less than two months before the law is due to start.
"Our office is committed to defending California's commonsense laws to protect kids online," the attorney general's office said. The companies argue that the state is overstepping its authority and that parents should make these decisions.
What does AB 1709 actually ban?
The statute adds a chapter to California's Business and Professions Code. The ban is direct, and the age threshold is explicit: 16. A covered platform "shall not provide an addictive feature to a user who is under 16 years of age," the statute says. It also requires reasonable measures to keep those features away from younger users.
An "addictive feature" means a "psychologically exploitative" feature intended to maximize engagement and foreseeably lead to compulsive use. The law names two examples: an addictive feed and autoplay. It also lets the attorney general add other features through regulations.
The definition of an addictive feed is broad. It covers a website, app or portion of one that recommends, selects or prioritizes user-generated media. That ranking can be based in whole or in part on information about the user or device. A feed built from who someone follows, what they liked or their stated interests can fall inside the definition.
The text lists exceptions. A user's explicit request for specific content is excluded when the media is not recommended on other user data. The next item in a preexisting sequence from the same creator is also excluded, provided video does not autoplay. Direct messages, search terms that are not persistently tied to the user, and privacy or accessibility settings are also outside the definition.
AB 1709 does not require platforms to remove every under-16 user. A platform may keep an account if the user receives no addictive feature. If it does not offer that stripped-down version, it must delete the account and the personal information linked to it.
The law reaches beyond apps usually described as social networks. A covered platform is any website or app that offers an addictive feature as a significant part of its service. Services limited to commercial transactions or product reviews are excluded, as are feeds run mainly for cloud storage.
The attorney general has latitude to shape the statute. Under the law, the attorney general may adopt regulations to implement and enforce the chapter. The statute also lets the attorney general alter which services count as covered platforms. That power applies when it is needed to reach apps that make addictive features available to under-16s. That rulemaking power is one reason the compliance picture may not be final on 1 January.
- •Banned for under-16s: algorithmic feeds and autoplay, plus any feature the attorney general later designates.
- •Allowed: accounts without addictive features, chronological next-item sequences from one creator, direct messages and explicit content requests.
- •Enforcement target: websites and apps where addictive features are a significant part of the service, not just classic social networks.
When does AB 1709 take effect, and how will age checks work?
AB 1709 is due to take effect on 1 January 2027. California's Digital Age Assurance Act is scheduled to begin the same day. That timing matters because AB 1709 does not build its own age-checking system. It borrows the one created by the earlier law, Assembly Bill 1043.
The Digital Age Assurance Act sets up a device-level system. Parents can enter a non-identifying age bracket for a child, and operating systems and app stores pass that signal to developers. Before providing an addictive feature, a covered platform must verify a user's age through that framework.
If a platform cannot verify age that way, the statute points to a fallback. The platform must rely on the age determination made under the earlier SB 976 process. In practice, the two laws are meant to fit together. One creates the age signal; the other uses it to decide who may receive a personalized feed.
The age check is tied to the feature, not to opening an account. A platform that offers under-16 users a version without addictive features does not need to push them off the service. That distinction is central to how companies may choose to comply.
The system depends on a parent or guardian setting an age bracket. If the signal is missing, the platform must use the fallback age determination under SB 976. How reliably that fallback identifies a teenager who has never been verified is one of the open questions in the law's design.
The privacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation has attacked this design. It argues that AB 1709 will push platforms toward strict checks, likely including government ID uploads or biometric scans. EFF says that would create repositories of sensitive data and weaken anonymity for users of all ages.
Why do the platforms say the law violates the First Amendment?
The three companies say AB 1709 violates the First Amendment and Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Reuters reported that the suits argue the law compels them to adopt California's preferred way of presenting content to children. It also substitutes the state's judgment for that of parents, they say.
Meta put the argument directly in its complaint. "The state cannot, consistent with the First Amendment, override Meta's editorial judgments," the company wrote. Meta also says California cannot regulate its curation alone. Children remain free to spend unlimited time on other online services with similar features, it argues.
Google focused on the practical effect on its products. "Parents are best positioned to make the right decisions for their families," spokesperson Jose Castaneda said. He also criticized the law's breadth. "Overly broad laws like this actually break the systems we've built to help kids find high-quality, age-appropriate videos," he said.
TikTok made a broader speech argument. That argument echoes a long-running tension in First Amendment law between protecting minors and preserving access to lawful speech. "Protected speech cannot be suppressed solely to protect the young from ideas or images that a legislative body thinks unsuitable," TikTok said.
The Section 230 claim is less straightforward. That federal law shields platforms from liability for third-party content, but AB 1709 regulates product design rather than the content itself. How much protection the statute offers against a design mandate is likely to be contested.
California's legislative findings lean heavily on the state's interest in protecting children. The bill declares that platforms are designed to maximize engagement and cites internal company research about compulsive use. It also says a minimum age for social media use is a reasonable way to reduce exposure during adolescence.
The companies frame the same evidence differently. They say the law is not limited to harmful material. In their view, it reaches ordinary curation, including recommendations that teenagers and their parents may want. That disagreement about how broadly the statute bites is likely to shape both the constitutional case and the compliance decisions.
EFF, which opposed the bill before it passed, makes a different critique. It says the definition of an addictive feed is so broad that it covers almost every functional recommendation system. In its view, stripping those systems for teenagers would leave them with a degraded version of services their peers use.
What does California say, and how would it enforce the law?
Newsom has framed the law as a minimum standard for products used by children. He described children's safety as central to any discussion about technology. "California will not stand by while unregulated technology puts our children at risk," he said when he signed the package in September.
The statute gives enforcement power only to the attorney general and local public prosecutors. It does not create a private right of action for parents or advocacy groups. That design concentrates litigation in state hands and keeps the companies' immediate opponent in these cases to Bonta's office.
Penalties are assessed per affected minor. A knowing violation can bring a civil penalty of up to $50,000 for each child. A negligent violation can bring up to $25,000. A court must consider the platform's size, the severity and duration of the violation, and any good-faith compliance efforts.
The per-minor structure means potential exposure rises with the number of under-16 users a platform serves in California. The law does not publish a cap on total liability. That gives large platforms a strong financial reason to change their products before enforcement begins.
AB 1709 also creates a seven-member e-Safety Advisory Commission. The governor appoints four members, and the Senate president pro tempore, Assembly speaker and attorney general each appoint one. The body is advisory only, but it must report annually to the Legislature and governor.
The commission's remit covers age-assurance technology and its privacy implications. It also covers the differential impact of age restrictions on different groups of young people. It can advise on the attorney general's rulemaking. Its recommendations are not binding on any state agency.
How does the earlier SB 976 ruling shape this fight?
California has already defended a related feed law in federal court. SB 976 is the Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act. It restricts minors' access to personalized feeds and lets parents consent to some features. Meta, TikTok and Google challenged those provisions in three cases filed in 2025.
The same judge had earlier considered a challenge to SB 976 brought by NetChoice, an internet trade group. The companies later filed their own cases, which produced the August ruling. That history means the court has already examined how recommendation systems work and how minors use them.
On 5 August 2026, U.S. District Judge Edward J. Davila denied the companies' requests for preliminary injunctions. The cases were Meta Platforms v. Bonta, TikTok v. Bonta and Google v. Bonta in the Northern District of California. The ruling allowed Bonta to enforce three personalized-feed sections while the cases continue.
The judge stressed that the decision was preliminary. "This is a preliminary injunction and further factual development could reveal that provisions not enjoined now are unconstitutional," he wrote. That caveat limits how much the ruling tells us about AB 1709, which is a different statute.
The earlier ruling still matters for the new lawsuits. It suggests that at least one federal judge in San Jose was not persuaded by the core speech claim. He found the challenged default provisions did not restrict YouTube's First Amendment rights on the record presented. The companies will now try to distinguish AB 1709, which goes further than SB 976.
The key difference is consent. SB 976 let a verified parent authorize an addictive feed for their child. AB 1709 removes that path for users under 16 and requires platforms to withhold the feature outright. That change may weaken one of the companies' underinclusiveness arguments, while creating new ones.
What happens next for teens, parents and platforms?
Nothing changes immediately. The lawsuits do not pause AB 1709, and no judge has granted relief. Platforms must decide before 1 January how to handle under-16 users in California. They can strip addictive features, delete those accounts, or risk per-minor penalties.
The scale is substantial. TikTok told the court in the SB 976 case that it had more than 170 million monthly users in the United States. YouTube said it hosts 20 billion videos. Even a change limited to California affects a large share of the audience for short-form video.
Creators and advertisers are exposed too. If platforms remove personalized recommendations for teenagers, the surfaces that generate impressions and session time shrink for that age group. The law does not regulate advertising directly, but it changes the inventory available to reach younger users.
For parents, the practical question is whether a platform will offer a teen version without autoplay and personalized recommendations. The alternative is closing accounts. For the companies, the choice is whether to build a separate California experience or apply the changes more broadly. A third option is to litigate and risk penalties.
The court fight is also unfolding alongside other litigation. The companies and Snap still face thousands of lawsuits over child addiction claims, Reuters reported. The plaintiffs include individuals, school districts and local governments. In August, Meta agreed to pay up to $18 billion under settlements with nearly all US states. It also agreed to limit teenagers' use of Facebook and Instagram.
Other countries are moving in a similar direction. Australia has a ban on social media for children under 16, which Reuters cited as part of a wider regulatory trend. California's approach differs because it targets specific features rather than banning accounts outright, but the political pressure is comparable.
The next signals to watch are the three federal dockets and the attorney general's regulations. The device-level age signal is also due to roll out on 1 January. Any one of them could change what compliance looks like before the law's first enforcement action.