Families sue Meta over teen suicides allegedly linked to Instagram

By Finance News On Dec 19, 2025

FOX Business correspondent Madison Alworth discusses allegations against Meta accusing them of burying evidence that their social media platforms cause harm and ignoring opportunities to implement safeguards on the ‘The Evening Edit.’

This story discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or 1-800-273-TALK (8255).

Two families filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Meta over their sons’ suicides, arguing that the tech giant failed to add proper safeguards to prevent sextortion schemes targeting teenagers on Instagram.

Tricia Maciejewski, of Pennsylvania, and Rosalind and Mark Downey, of Scotland, filed a lawsuit on Wednesday, saying their sons fell for the same sextortion scheme, in which a stranger messages a teenager on social media pretending to be a romantic interest before soliciting nude photos. The stranger then threatens to share the images with friends and family unless the victim shares more images or sends money.

Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook, is facing at least four other sextortion-related lawsuits that claim Instagram ignored complaints about the scheme for years.

The families in the latest lawsuit allege their sons’ deaths “were the foreseeable result of Meta’s design decisions and repeated refusals to implement affordable, available, and identified safety features due to Meta’s prioritization of engagement over user safety.”

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Two families filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Meta over their sons’ suicides. (Matt Cardy/Getty Images / Getty Images)

Maciejewski’s 13-year-old son, Levi, died by suicide in 2024, and the Downeys’ 16-year-old son, Murray, took his life in 2023. Both teenage boys were victims to sextortion schemes on Instagram.

The families claim that Meta knew its recommendation system was connecting children with potential predators and that the company failed to adequately address the issue.

The plaintiffs cited a 2022 internal audit that found Instagram’s “Accounts You May Follow” tool suggested 1.4 million accounts to teenage users in a single day that were potentially engaging in inappropriate interactions with minors.

Meta safety researchers recommended in 2019 that the company default all teenage accounts into private settings, but the company declined to do this a year later, according to the lawsuit.

In 2021, Meta announced new restrictions on direct messaging between teenagers and adults that they do not follow, but the lawsuit argues the changes were faulty and only applied to new teenage accounts rather than representing a “true default setting.”