WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court seemed skeptical Wednesday of a lawsuit trying to hold social media companies responsible for a terrorist attack at a Turkish nightclub that killed 39 people.
During arguments at the high court several justices underscored that there was no evidence linking Twitter, Facebook and Google directly to the 2017 attack on the Reina nightclub in Istanbul. The family of a man killed in the attack says the companies aided and abetted the attack because they assisted in the growth of the Islamic State group, which claimed responsibility for the attack . A lower court let the lawsuit go forward.
The court’s disposition of Wednesday’s case and a related one it heard a day earlier is important, particularly because the companies have been shielded from liability on the internet, allowing them to grow into the giants they are today.
If the court bars the lawsuit involving the attack in Turkey from going forward it could avoid a major ruling on the companies’ legal immunity. That outcome would leave the current system in place, but also leave open the possibility that the justices could take up the issue again in a later case.