A look at major lawsuits against Meta and other social media companies over harms to kids

A settlement announced Wednesday between Meta and dozens of states resolves one of its biggest legal fights, but the social media giant is still facing litigation elsewhere over its products' effects on young people's mental health.

The deal cut short a landmark trial in federal court in Oakland, California, where the Instagram and Facebook parent company was fighting claims that it deliberately designed features that get children addicted. The agreement calls for Meta to pay out up to $18 billion and make a changes to how their platforms are operated, with new guardrails for kid safety.

It is one of many courtrooms around the country where Meta, TikTok, Snapchat and YouTube have been defending themselves against allegations their platforms have negatively impacted children’s mental health or otherwise hurt them.

Here is a look at some of the biggest cases against social media companies.

Smart Suite lets families of children with disabilities learn how adaptive design, tech can improve their lives

The first thing Zoe Versteeg did after rolling into the living room was to change the hue-lighting colour to match the shade of her lavender glasses. The smile that spread across her face was nearly as bright as the lights in the room.

“It’s just joy, immediate joy when she sees something happening. She’s like, ‘I control that, I got to do that,’” Elsien Versteeg, Zoe’s mother, said. “Her being able to make those decisions on her own, she can just do it herself now.”

Zoe, who is 13 and non-verbal, uses eye-gaze technology to communicate and control both her wheelchair and an array of smart devices. Versteeg and Zoe were at the official opening of the Rehabilitation Centre for Children’s new Smart Suite on Aug. 26, where the team behind the project was demonstrating the breadth of adaptive design and technologies available locally for families of children with disabilities to provide them with greater independence.

The Versteegs use many of the devices in their own home near New Bothwell.

Canadian Army looking for surveillance, cargo-drop drone suppliers

OTTAWA - The federal government has put out a small shopping list for new drones for the Canadian Army, which includes land and aerial drones that can deliver cargo and supply munitions to troops.

It's also looking for aerial surveillance and reconnaissance drones, including some specifically designed to operate in "extreme cold" Arctic environments.

Ottawa has issued a batch of five tenders under the army's Minerva initiative, a program designed to integrate drones into its operations.

“The Canadian Army soldier will face an increasingly complex and dangerous battlespace in the future," one of the drone tenders said.

Lucky Charms and Trix go au naturel as General Mills ditches artificial colors

General Mills said Wednesday it has removed artificial colors from all its U.S. cereals, including Lucky Charms and Trix.

The Minneapolis company has shifted to fruit- and vegetable-based dyes as well as colors derived from spices like turmeric and paprika to give its cereals their customary bright colors.

“This achievement reflects how we are evolving with consumer needs while continuing to offer food that tastes great, delivers quality and provides value,” said Bethany Quam, General Mills’ president of cereal, in a statement.

General Mills said 90% of its U.S. retail products are now free of artificial dyes. Products that still contain artificial colors, like some Betty Crocker cake mixes and Fruit Roll-Ups, will transition to natural dyes by the end of 2027, the company said.

Winnipeg police body cams to feature AI translator

The Winnipeg Police Service will begin testing an artificial intelligence translation tool on Thursday, adding the feature to its body-worn camera pilot project.

The translation tool works with more than 50 languages and will initially be used by the 40 front-line officers who began testing the cameras in June.

When a button is pressed, the device will recognize the language being spoken and translate it into English. The officer can respond in English or French and have the device translate their words into the language spoken by the other person.

“What it effectively does is allow that immediate transfer of communication to occur, without having to find a translator,” said George Labossière, WPS deputy chief of operations.

Buy Canadian: Purchasing patriotism sees renewed push amid rising tariffs

Buy Canadian sentiment is seeing a resurgence across the country as backlash to U.S. tariffs grows.

Consumers eager to support local products and businesses are swapping shopping tips and resources online as some retailers renew labelling of tariffed or homegrown goods in stores.

The Canada List, a website that ranks thousands of products sold in Canada based on their contribution to the Canadian economy, has seen a dramatic rise in traffic in recent days, founder Matthew Shane said in an interview Wednesday.

"My back-of-the-envelope calculation is daily traffic is actually up 10,000 per cent since Friday," Shane said, adding thousands of people are signing up for the newsletter daily. "It's a strong indication that the Canadian public is increasingly engaged in these trade tensions."

Grocers revive signage to indicate tariff-affected items, Canadian products

Canadian grocers are adding more signage to highlight homegrown products as trade tensions escalate between Canada and the United States.

Loblaw says it is bringing back the T symbols to its grocery shelf labels to signal products that have seen price increases due to tariffs, replicating its response from last year when the tariff war first began.

Customers will start noticing the T symbols on a small number of products, which will grow as tariffs are applied across more categories, Loblaw chief executive Per Bank wrote in a LinkedIn post on Tuesday.

"And one commitment is especially important: Loblaw will not benefit from tariffs," he said.

Meta reaches landmark $18 billion settlement with states in trial over teen social media addiction

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Meta agreed Wednesday to pay up to $18 billion and add stronger child-safety measures to its Facebook and Instagram platforms as part of a landmark legal settlement that ended a trial over teen social media addiction and settled claims filed by nearly every state.

The settlement resolved a pivotal case years in the making that sought to hold the tech giant accountable for the role its platforms played in undermining children’s mental health. The effort targeted features designed to hook young people’s attention.

The agreement “institutes real change, real transparency, real protections for children and teens across the country,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said.

If approved by the court, the deal will stop an avalanche of litigation by states against Meta, although the company still faces lawsuits from individuals and school districts throughout the U.S. For the states, the settlement delivers money for mental-health programs for kids, including after-school or summer activities and digital literacy counselors.

Arts & Life team taste-tests new Kraft concoction

Prepare your tongue for the ultimate thrill, as Kraft Dinner has once again veered wildly out of its box and into new territory.

Software engineer who built lessons on AI for kids was ‘terrified’ into action

When Mohamad Alhamoud witnessed his young son ask an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot to do his homework for him, the software engineer felt “terrified.”

It was midway through the 2024-25 school year and the boy, then a Grade 3 student in Winnipeg’s Louis Riel School Division, had been tasked with inventing something new.

“This was supposed to be his moment of innovation, of imagination, of trying to come up with something on his own,” Alhamoud said.

The father of three has since turned his panic into motivation to help his kids and their classmates become digitally literate.

AI literacy course mandatory at U of W Collegiate

The University of Winnipeg Collegiate is requiring new students to complete artificial intelligence 101 lessons and offering a first-of-its-kind elective for those who want to perfect their chatbot prompts.

The private high school is piloting two projects this year in a bid to improve digital literacy on the downtown campus.

Every Grade 9 and 10 student will have to pass an approximately two-hour long online course about “AI essentials.”

Dean Osaed Khan likened the mandatory e-learning sessions to requiring students to complete a safety course before they can participate in a science lab.

Entrepreneurial spotlight finds IndigiHub

The list of accolades keeps getting longer for the Winnipeg-based founder of IndigiHub, an online resource for Indigenous entrepreneurs.

Earth is simmering in its hottest water temps on record, and that’s bad for fish and us

The world's oceans simmered to their hottest temperatures on record over the weekend and are likely to warm even further in the next few months, putting stress on life in the water and on land too, the European climate service Copernicus announced Monday.

Spurred by a still growing but already supersized natural El Nino and human-caused climate change, the world's ocean temperatures hit 21.1 degrees Celsius (70 degrees Fahrenheit) on Friday and Saturday, narrowly edging out the average daily record set in March 2024, said Samantha Burgess, strategic climate lead for Copernicus.

“This is yet another sign of our climate system under strain and the ocean under immense pressure,” Burgess said.

Jane Lubchenco, an oceanographer and former chief of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration called the record “very troubling.”

Small businesses at front lines of tariff war, as many lose sales

Since the latest U.S. tariffs rolled in this past weekend, Bernard Hellen has been fielding order cancellations for 3D miniature models — all previously bound for his American clients.

"I've probably had about 50 order cancellations this morning alone," said Hellen, owner of Toronto-based Miniprints, which makes railroading hobby miniatures of animals and figurines.

For Hellen, Americans make up 85 per cent of his sales.

"A 50 per cent tax is more than the average American consumer can pay or is willing to pay," he said in a phone interview on Monday.

‘How can we grow back the herd in Canada?’

Amid high beef prices and trade uncertainty, a Farm Credit Canada executive touched down in Winnipeg with a message: it’s time for cattle producers to grow.

“What they face right now is … opportunity,” said Jean-Philippe Gervais, the federal Crown corporation’s executive vice-president of agricultural production.

Gervais was representing FCC, the country’s top agricultural lender, at the Canadian Beef Industry Conference.

He spoke to the Free Press ahead of his keynote speech Thursday afternoon. Hundreds of cattle farmers and industry leaders gathered at the RBC Convention Centre for the four-day event, which began on Monday.

Texas barbecue is getting a halal makeover

FORT WORTH, Texas (RNS) — At 9 a.m. on a scorching Saturday in June, nearly 100 people were already lined up outside Goldee’s BBQ, a small, wooden-shack restaurant.

First in line was 30-year-old Thanh Huynh, who had been sitting in a lawn chair on the joint’s rustic porch since 6:30 a.m.

“I have, like, a whole list, and I’m going to spend lots of money here. It’ll be worth it,” he said, laughing while rattling off a long order of meats and sides from his phone’s Notes app as a sweet, smoky scent from nearby pits hung in the air.

Opened in 2020 by a group of his friends, the restaurant was named the No. 1 barbecue spot in the state by Texas Monthly a year later, and then won a Bib Gourmand award from the prestigious Michelin Guide, given for “great food at a great value.”

WestJet ordered to scrap weight cap on power wheelchairs

WestJet is imposing an “undue barrier” on travellers living with a disability by effectively barring some power wheelchairs from its planes, says Canada’s transport regulator.

In a recent decision, the Canadian Transportation Agency said the country’s second-largest carrier must scrap its 300-pound weight cap on mobility aids before July 2027.

WestJet should use "spreader plates" to better distribute the wheelchair's weight in the cargo hold and arrange alternative travel with other airlines until then, the regulator said.

The case was brought before the transportation agency by Winnipeg resident Steven Fletcher, a former federal minister of state for transport, after he was stopped from flying with his custom wheelchair on a flight between Winnipeg and Toronto early last year.

Pre-owned sets seller Romo’s Bricks seeks to click with Winnipeg’s Lego community

There’s no mortar in sight but there are certainly thousands of bricks at a new brick-and-mortar store in Winnipeg catering to Lego enthusiasts.

Ashton Romaniuk and Madison Froome opened Romo’s Bricks in late spring. Located at 955 Milt Stegall Dr., in the same building as CanCentral Sports Cards & Memorabilia, the store specializes in selling pre-owned Lego sets, minifigures and other Lego-related products.

“It’s something we’re both passionate about,” Froome said.

To stock the store, she and Romaniuk spent $50,000 on four large Lego collections, purchased from local collectors. Romaniuk estimates that since the store opened on June 2, inventory has grown to $250,000 worth of Lego.

Amazon set to expand drone delivery of lightweight packages to 500 US cities

Millions more people may be able to get smaller, lightweight Amazon packages delivered by drones by the end of the year under a plan the company announced Wednesday to expand the airborne shipping to suburban areas in nearly 500 U.S. cities.

Customers could receive the drone deliveries in as fast as 30 minutes, Amazon said in a news release. The drones can carry packages up to 5 pounds.

The plan will intensify the battle between Amazon and Walmart to provide consumers with the fastest delivery times. Both giants rely on a mix of drones and drivers to deliver everything consumers have ordered.

The goal is not necessarily about cutting costs by replacing drivers and trucks — and drones that can only carry one package at a time would have a hard time doing that. But instead, these companies are using drones as one tool to help keep customers happy with quicker deliveries, banking on a faster delivery system attracting more shoppers.

In Meta’s trial, families of social media victims see a pivotal moment for online safety

As opening statements kicked off Tuesday in a trial for Meta Platforms, advocates and parents of social media victims gathered outside the federal courthouse in Oakland, California, with a banner that stretched several feet across.

Written on it in black ink were the names of children and young adults who have died from social media related harms, including deaths by suicide after bouts of cyberbullying or sextortion. Giovanni, an 11-year-old, Bubba, a 13-year-old, and Englyn, a 14-year-old, were among the nearly 600 names. Parents said the names were “just the tip of the iceberg.”

“Behind us, justice is going to be served,″ said Lennon Torres, an advocate with the organization Heat Initiative. “The courtroom doors are open, and it is time that the public see what the executives at Meta have known all along: that their products are designed to addict and to harm children.″

Many of the gathered parents have attended previous trials, congressional hearings and other events related to online child safety. But they say this trial, in which the attorneys general from four states are seeking billions of dollars in damages for social media harms to children, marks a significant moment.

MamiMarkets connecting ethnic food vendors, customers

A West African soup recipe and a fruitless search for ingredients led to a business opportunity for two Manitoba entrepreneurs.

Manitoba honey industry buzzing as U.S. tariff clock ticks

Canadian product is being rushed to the United States ahead of a threatened 50 per cent tariff on the industry.

From the Plate to the Mic: Several former Blue Jays active in baseball podcast space

TORONTO - The post-season hangover lasted a lot longer than Toronto Blue Jays fans expected this year.

A slow start coupled with mid-season struggles nearly derailed the 2026 campaign for Canada's lone big-league team. However, a strong run of form after the recent trade deadline has lifted Toronto back into the playoff race.

With interest ramping up for the reigning American League champions, the timing couldn't be better for several former Blue Jays who moved into the baseball podcast space this year.

One such offering is the "Get It Done League" podcast featuring former sluggers Josh Donaldson and Russell Martin with broadcaster Arash Madani. The title serves as a nod to a memorable Donaldson quote from the 2015 season.