Supreme Court wrestles with lawsuit shield for social media

WASHINGTON >> In its first case about the federal law that is credited with helping create the modern internet, the Supreme Court seemed unlikely Tuesday to side with a family wanting to hold Google liable for the death of their daughter in a terrorist attack.

At the same time, the justices also signaled in arguments lasting two and a half hours that they are wary of Google’s claims that a 1996 law, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, affords it, Twitter, Facebook and other companies far-reaching immunity from lawsuits over their targeted recommendations of videos, documents and other content.

The case highlighted the tension between technology policy fashioned a generation ago and the reach of today’s social media, numbering billions of posts each day.

“We really don’t know about these things. You know, these are not like the nine greatest experts on the internet,” Justice Elena Kagan said of herself and her colleagues, several of whom smiled at the description.

Congress, not the court, should make needed changes to a law passed early in the internet age, Kagan said.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, one of six conservatives, agreed with his liberal colleague in a case that seemed to cut across ideological lines.

“Isn’t it better,” Kavanaugh asked, to keep things the way they are and “put the burden on Congress to change that?”

The case before the court stems from the death of American college student Nohemi Gonzalez in a terrorist attack in Paris in 2015. Members of her family were in the courtroom to listen to arguments about whether they can sue Google-owned YouTube for helping the Islamic State spread its message and attract new recruits, in violation of the Anti-Terrorism Act. Lower courts sided with Google.