New York Court Rules Social Media Not Liable Buffalo Shooting

A New York state appellate court ruled that major social media companies, including Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, Google’s YouTube, and Reddit, cannot be held liable for allegedly aiding the radicalization of Payton Gendron, the white supremacist responsible for the 2022 Buffalo mass shooting that killed 10 Black people. The 3-2 decision reversed a lower court ruling, citing Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act, which protects online platforms from liability over user-generated content. Justice Stephen Lindley, writing for the majority, emphasized that imposing liability could end the internet as it currently exists by exposing platforms to lawsuits for content they sort and display, while dissenting justices argued that forcing targeted extremist content goes beyond Section 230’s protections. The plaintiffs, including victims’ families and witnesses, argued that platform algorithms were addictive and amplified extremist content influencing Gendron, but the court sided with the platforms, which claimed they were merely hosts, not creators, of such content. Gendron was sentenced to life in prison without parole on state charges and faces federal hate crime charges with a trial scheduled for August 2026. The ruling reflects ongoing debates about social media’s role in curbing online extremism and the balance between platform immunity and responsibility.