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Proving Negligence in a Snapchat Sexual Abuse Lawsuit: Legal Strategies and Challenges

While sexual abuse lawsuits often target the perpetrators themselves, there are other parties that may bear legal responsibility, such as social media platforms. For example, Snap, Inc., the parent company of messaging app Snapchat has been sued by multiple state attorneys general.

These lawsuits make numerous allegations against the platform, such as facilitating child sextortion, sexual exploitation of minors and exposing children to sexual predators.

Survivors or their parents may also be able to pursue legal action against Snapchat. This includes survivors or parents of survivors who were abused, groomed or exploited after they were contacted on Snapchat.

One of the central challenges of these lawsuits is establishing the platform’s liability for the actions of people using the popular messaging app. Below, review some of the main aspects of liability in a Snapchat sexual abuse lawsuit.

Does the Platform’s Design Create a Dangerous Environment for Underage Users?

Snapchat sexual abuse lawsuits often cite the design and features of the platform. These are not minor concerns about the app. The very structure of the app is putting children at risk for abuse and exploitation.

The June 2025 lawsuit filed by Utah’s attorney general alleges the features of the app were designed to exploit vulnerable children as a way to increase profits.

Lawsuits claim there are foreseeable risks with the app that can be exploited by child predators.

Lack of Strong Age Verification and Fake Profiles

Despite the risks of harm to children, Snapchat has a weak age verification system that is easy to exploit. All you need to do is enter your birth date to show you are over the age of 13. There is no further age verification.

Predators can simply lie about their age and claim they are teenagers. They can steal pictures of teenagers from the Internet and put them on their profiles. Predators can carefully craft their profiles to make children feel like they are safe communicating with these people.

Poor age verification could be used to support the argument that Snapchat created foreseeable risks. The company may have also failed to warn parents about the potential danger to their children.

The New Mexico attorney general’s lawsuit against Snapchat claims executives said they knew they could not verify the ages of their users. They also said known perpetrators were getting through their safety systems.

The legal complaint said Snapchat officials had considered the cost of addressing child grooming against the administrative burden, and they believed it was not worth the effort.

More to the point, Snapchat executives may have known they had a serious problem. Employees of the company had warned about the dangers of the design of the platform. The platform’s own research found that sextortion was a rampant problem on the platform. One-third of teenage girls reported they had unwanted contact on the platform.

Messages That Disappear

Part of the appeal of Snapchat is that the messages quickly disappear after they are sent. This may seem like a good thing at first, but it creates multiple advantages for predators:

Parents have a difficult time finding out what is happening with their child
Predators see an opportunity to send sexual content that children are not going to understand
Predators can tell the children they are communicating with that people are not going to see sexual content
Potential evidence of illegal or harmful content is immediately erased, making it much more difficult for law enforcement officials to file criminal charges and pursue a case

While these features serve legitimate purposes for many users, plaintiffs argue that they may also create opportunities for grooming or exploitation.

Encouraging Addictive Behavior

One of the goals for many social media companies, including Snapchat, seems to be to increase screen time. There are many features that encourage people to constantly check the app, such as notifications, disappearing messages and Snapstreaks. This promotes addiction to the platform, putting children at increased risk for online predators.

Establishing a Breach of the Duty of Care

To establish breach of duty, plaintiffs typically must demonstrate that the company knew or reasonably should have known that its platform could be used for harmful conduct.

Attorneys may cite the following forms of evidence to prove Snap, Inc. knew their app could be used to harm children:

Prior reports of exploitation or abuse on Snapchat
Internal communications or safety assessments from the company
Academic research on online grooming behaviors
Government investigations into social media safety practices
Public complaints or user reports

If plaintiffs can show that a platform knew or should have known about the possible risks and failed to take adequate steps to protect children, the company may have breached its duty of care.

Social media companies may have a heightened duty of care when it comes to minors, as minor often have a harder time assessing danger the way an adult can. There may also be a heightened duty of care when children represent a substantial proportion of a platform’s users.

Establishing Causation in Social Media Liability Cases

Even if plaintiffs establish a breached duty of care, they must still prove the platform’s action or inaction meaningfully contributed to harm.

Defendants frequently argue that the criminal actions of third parties, not platform design, are the true cause of harm. However, plaintiffs may argue that the platform’s structure enabled or facilitated exploitation in ways that materially contributed to the injury.

For example, plaintiffs may argue:

Snapchat was designed in a way that allowed predators to contact minors more easily
Safety features were not strong enough or were difficult to access
Snapchat allowed grooming to occur undetected
The design of the app encouraged private interactions with limited oversight

In Snapchat sexual abuse lawsuits, courts must determine whether the platform’s conduct merely provided a venue for communication or whether its design choices meaningfully contributed to the alleged harm.

Section 230 as a Major Legal Barrier

Perhaps the most significant obstacle in these cases is Communications Decency Act Section 230.

Section 230 generally provides that online platforms cannot be treated as the publisher or speaker of content created by users. This law has historically shielded Big Tech companies from liability for user-generated content. Platforms like Snapchat have traditionally not been treated like publishers.

That is why law firms, like Dolman Law Group, have focused on holding the platform liability for negligence in design.

Discovery and Evidence Challenges

Platforms such as Snapchat are known for ephemeral messaging systems in which communications automatically disappear after being viewed. This design can complicate the process of obtaining evidence for litigation.

Some of the challenges in these cases may include: