Background
Thousands of lawsuits in multidistrict litigation alleged that Meta’s Facebook and Instagram platforms encourage addictive behavior, fail to verify users’ ages, help adolescents bypass parental controls, and inadequately protect against—or intentionally amplify—harmful and exploitative content. The district court organized the litigation into several tracks involving personal-injury plaintiffs, state attorneys general, school districts and local governments, and claims against Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Meta moved to dismiss claims brought in several tracks, arguing in relevant part that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act barred substantial portions of them. The district court granted Section 230 protection as to some allegations implicating Meta’s role as publisher of third-party content but allowed other claims to proceed. Meta and the TikTok entities appealed without obtaining certification under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b), asserting that the rulings were immediately appealable collateral orders under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. The plaintiff groups filed protective conditional cross-appeals while disputing appellate jurisdiction.
The Court’s Holding
The Ninth Circuit held that Section 230 supplies a defense to liability, not immunity from suit. Because an order rejecting that defense can be reviewed effectively after final judgment, the district court’s partial denials of Meta’s motions to dismiss did not satisfy the third requirement of the collateral order doctrine. The court found no explicit statutory guarantee that a provider protected by Section 230 has a right to avoid trial.
The orders also failed the doctrine’s other two requirements. They did not conclusively resolve the Section 230 questions because the district court allowed certain claims to proceed “for now” and indicated that it could revisit the issue as the litigation developed. Nor were the Section 230 questions completely separate from the merits, because deciding whether a claim treats a defendant as the publisher or speaker of third-party content requires examination of the claim’s factual allegations and theory of liability.
The Ninth Circuit therefore dismissed Meta’s and TikTok’s appeals and the plaintiffs’ conditional cross-appeals for lack of appellate jurisdiction. It denied Meta’s emergency motion to stay trial as moot.
Key Takeaways
- Section 230 is a defense to liability rather than immunity from suit.
- A district court’s interlocutory denial of a Section 230 defense is not immediately appealable under the collateral order doctrine.
- The Ninth Circuit dismissed all six consolidated appeals and cross-appeals without deciding whether Section 230 ultimately bars the underlying claims.
Why It Matters
The decision prevents social-media companies from taking an appeal as of right whenever a district court declines to dismiss claims under Section 230. Unless another route to interlocutory review is available, defendants generally must litigate through final judgment before obtaining appellate review of that defense.
The opinion also distinguishes courts’ occasional shorthand references to Section 230 “immunity” from the specific immunity from suit required for immediate collateral-order review. The underlying claims against Meta and the other defendants remain for further proceedings in the district court.