The Texas Supreme Court ruled Facebook could be held liable if sex traffickers use the platform to prey on children, arguing the social media website is not a “lawless no-man’s-land.” The ruling was made following three Houston-area lawsuits involving teenage trafficking victims who alleged they met their abusers through Facebook’s messaging service. Prosecutors also said that Facebook was negligent by not doing more to block sex traffickers from using the site. “We do not understand Section 230 to ‘create a lawless no-man’s-land on the Internet’ in which states are powerless to impose liability on websites that knowingly or intentionally participate in the evil of online human trafficking,” the Supreme Court’s majority wrote. Facebook has contended that it is protected under Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act—a law that has been frequently criticized by Republicans, including former President Donald Trump. Critics have said the rule, which shields online platforms from …
The Texas Supreme Court ruled Facebook could be held liable if sex traffickers use the platform to prey on children, arguing the social media website is not a “lawless no-man’s-land.” The ruling was made following three Houston-area lawsuits involving teenage trafficking victims who alleged they met their abusers through Facebook’s messaging service. Prosecutors also said that
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