The plaintiffs’ bar today is bringing its resources and creativity to bear in attempting to use traditional tort theories to impose liability on some of the leading players in the technology industry. Starting with social media platforms and now expanding to video game developers and platforms, dating apps, online gambling and gaming platforms and AI chatbots, the plaintiffs’ bar is asking courts – with varying success – to impose traditional tort principles of negligence, strict product liability and fraud on the publication of third-party content and online speech and the technologies that transmit it to millions.

We have been involved in tech tort litigation since the first lawsuits filed against social media companies addressing issues raised by user-generated content and online speech. Our Tech Torts team integrates deep experience in product liability, consumer class actions and State Attorney General matters to defend technology companies facing high‑stakes litigation implicating Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the First Amendment, community guidelines and intellectual property. 

Critical to our success is our understanding of how complex online technologies function and the challenges companies face in developing minor safety and wellbeing policies while balancing free expression and other user rights. Drawing on extensive counseling experience, we know how to explain platform design, moderation systems and user interaction to judges and juries. 

Leaders in helping clients navigate the peculiarities of federal multidistrict litigation and state coordinated proceedings, we regularly lead the defense of some of the nation’s largest MDLs and other coordinated proceedings involving technology companies. Led by former federal clerks, our team drives briefing strategy from inception through appeal, developing novel legal arguments, advancing jurisdictional and dispositive motions, managing trial briefing and positioning cases for success at every stage.

Our team is further distinguished by a dedicated team of lawyer‑scientists and scientific specialists, including professionals with advanced degrees and expertise in epidemiology, biostatistics, addiction science, human factors, computer science and design, psychiatry and suicidology. They work alongside trial teams to develop comprehensive strategies to challenge and defeat unsupported scientific theories through expert reports, depositions and critical legal challenges.