Podcast Summary: Left To Their Own Devices – "See You in Court"

Host: Ava Smithing, Toronto Star
Release Date: October 31, 2025
Theme:
This gripping episode delves into the legal frontlines of the digital age, chronicling the efforts to hold Big Tech accountable for enabling harm to children and adolescents. Through Ava Smithing’s personal lens and in-depth interviews with three prominent lawyers—Raul Torres, Duncan Embury, and Laura Marquez Garrett—the episode explores the groundbreaking lawsuits and strategies employed to challenge the unchecked power of Meta, Snap, TikTok, and others. It’s a raw, unflinching survival story about the fight for safety and justice in 21st-century childhood.

Episode Overview

• Main Theme:
  The episode investigates how attorneys and survivors are turning to lawsuits as a means to force accountability on social media giants for harm to children—including sexual exploitation, addiction, mental health crises, and educational disruption. Through extensive investigative reporting and court action, change is being demanded in the absence of legislative regulation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Dark Shift of Childhood Online (00:01–04:20)

• Raul Torres’s Background:
  Veteran prosecutor describes his early work on violent crime and child abuse cases—“the really hard cases, the ones most people don’t even want to think about.”

  “Those are things that stay with you.” – Raul Torres (01:14)

• Transformation with Social Media:
  The darkest corners hosting abuse became mainstream—social media connects predators to victims more easily than ever.

  “That darkest corner of the Internet has now been pushed to the most accessible social media applications...” – Raul Torres (01:49)

2. Taking On Big Tech in Court (04:20–14:44)

• Litigation as Accountability:
  With governments failing to regulate, lawyers like Torres aggressively pursue lawsuits against Meta and Snap.
  • Meta Lawsuit Tactics:
    Undercover decoy accounts, like “Issa B”, demonstrate how quickly children are targeted on Facebook—flooded with explicit messages, harassed, and further exploited by algorithms.

    “76% of teenage girls have received unsolicited dick pics.” – Ava Smithing (06:48)
    “Meta had a sense of what was happening to Issa, but rather than try to protect her, they used that information to advertise to her.” – Ava Smithing (08:10)

  • Allegation Severity:
    Lawsuit claims Meta platforms are “a breeding ground for predators,” with investigators finding child sexual abuse material (CSAM) promoted by Instagram algorithms.

    “Instagram was helping pedophiles find it, by promoting graphic hashtags...” – Duncan Embury (10:45) “What the hell were you thinking?” – Senator Ted Cruz to Mark Zuckerberg, referencing Instagram’s handling of CSAM (11:12)

  • Corporate Priorities:
    Meta, instead of fixing products, spends billions fighting lawsuits and lobbying.

    “Their values are situational. Their ethics are situational. It’s their bottom line that matters the most.” – Raul Torres (12:56)

3. School Systems Under Siege (14:17–24:15)

• Duncan Embury’s Perspective:
  Former medical malpractice litigator now represents Ontario school boards suing Meta, TikTok, and Snap for havoc wrought on education.
  • Personal Impact:
    Sharing how his own daughter struggled with addiction and attempted suicide linked to TikTok.

    “When it wasn’t available to her, that was the result. I’m happy to say I’m one of the lucky ones. Not every parent, not every student gets that second chance.” – Duncan Embury (15:36)

  • Educational Harm:
    Lawsuit alleges platforms damage mental health, attention spans, and ability to learn, straining teachers and IT staff.

    “As soon as a student looks at their phone, they’re gone.” – Duncan Embury (18:07)

    • Systemic Costs:
      Schools demand $8 billion in damages for the cumulative burden.
  • Legal Argument:
    Asserting social platforms have a novel legal “duty of care” to students—an evolving interpretation to match the digital era.

    “We have to allow our law to evolve with that in order to protect our citizenry.” – Duncan Embury (20:45)

    • Evidence of Knowing Harm:
      Discovery from U.S. cases reveals internal studies showing habit-forming design within 35 minutes of use.

      “To my knowledge, there’s no other product that can develop habit forming tendency in 35 minutes.” – Duncan Embury (22:26)

4. Survivor Lawsuits & Patterns of Harm (24:57–34:56)

• Laura Marquez Garrett’s Fight:
  Once a premier corporate lawyer, now representing victims directly—including young women, families of children lost to suicide or drugs, and parents battling AI chatbot harms.
  • Personal Realizations:
    On discovering Silicon Valley designers won’t let their own kids use their products:

    “Every alarm bell went off...they know they’re hurting kids.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (25:40)

    • Addiction at Home:
      Describes her own 4-year-old’s tantrums when breaking YouTube Kids’ habit.

      “This child was not my child. And I realized in that moment, like I addicted my four year old child.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (26:16)

  • Emerging Data & Patterns:
    Across thousands of clients, a pattern emerges: social media disproportionately exposes teens (but not adults) to explicit solicitation, fostering addiction, secrecy, anxiety, and depression.

    “It’s pimping out our kids, basically.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (29:13)

    • Addiction and Isolation:
      Social media undermines household rules, causes sleep deprivation, and seeds a cycle of guilt and mental health decline.

      “They start to hate themselves because they are addicts.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (30:03) “Me absolutely being conscious of the fact that Instagram was ripping me apart and being so annoyed with that consciousness that I would even scratch it out.” – Ava Smithing (31:40)

  • Expanding Lawsuits:
    SVLC sues for harms ranging from compulsive use and self-harm content to fentanyl bought via Snapchat, and suicide encouraged by AI bots.

    “Family members of 60 people who died from fentanyl overdoses across the country are now suing the social media app Snapchat.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (32:21)

  • Legal Strategies:
    Rather than focus on Section 230 protections, Laura alleges product defect, likening the case to lawsuits against tobacco and asbestos.

    “These are deliberate design decisions...causing harm.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (33:44)

    • Why Litigation Matters:

      “The reason that companies don’t kill people, the reason companies fix things, it’s so they don’t get sued.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (34:40)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “[Meta] is the most dangerous.” – Raul Torres (05:17)
• “It is killing kids...If all we get is money judgments and they keep killing kids, we’ve lost. So when someone asks, what are the odds that you win? …I’ll die trying.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (04:20)
• “This isn’t third party speech...It’s like tobacco. It’s like asbestos. These are deliberate design decisions.” – Laura Marquez Garrett (33:44)
• “If we can establish that you knowingly targeted students during the time they were in school...that’s why there’s a duty.” – Duncan Embury (21:36)
• “They don’t get to stand outside a kid’s house and tell him he should go kill himself...So why do these companies get to do it?” – Laura Marquez Garrett (32:45)
• “What’s at stake to some extent is our public education system...It is the fundamental tenet of a just democratic society.” – Duncan Embury (24:15)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Introduction/Content Warning: 00:01–00:16
• Raul Torres’s Journey & Early Cases: 00:16–02:51
• Lawsuit Against Meta – Evidence Tactics: 05:17–08:42
• Meta’s Algorithms & Harm: 08:42–11:06
• Internal Tech Company Resistance: 11:45–13:54
• School Board Lawsuit – Mental Health & Learning Impact: 14:17–19:29
• Legal Duty of Care Argument: 20:45–21:54
• Discovery & Internal Documents: 22:26–23:40
• Duncan Embury – Stakes for Public Education: 24:15
• Laura Marquez Garrett – Personal Motivations & Lawsuits: 25:07–34:08
• Garrett’s Novel Legal Strategies: 33:27–33:44
• Concluding Reflections: 34:56–35:22

Tone & Takeaways

• Tone: Intense, urgent, and deeply personal. The episode is rich with survivor testimony, legal drama, and investigative grit, all delivered in straightforward, sometimes haunting language.
• Takeaway:
  Lawsuits have become the main avenue for pushing social platforms to take responsibility for the safety of young users. Survivors and their advocates are learning the tactics of large-scale litigation to fight the immense resources of Big Tech. As legislative fixes remain stalled, the courtroom becomes the battleground to demand safety, honesty, and change for a generation left to their own devices.

(Note: Ads, intros, and credits have been omitted. This summary captures all primary content discussed in the episode for listeners seeking a thorough understanding of its key arguments, facts, and advocacy.)