[Note: my blogging hiatus is due to a trip to China. I will return to the US this weekend and presumably resume my regular blogging cadence then.]
This is a confusing lawsuit that has been through several names, including “Sarah v. Google” and “Unknown Parties v. Google.” The court previously described the core allegations:
The plaintiffs allege that Onision “ran several YouTube channels” that “targeted minor audiences” and allowed Onision to “groom and lure underage girls.” According to the plaintiffs, YouTube is liable because it provided a platform for Onision to reach young girls and because it shared advertising revenue with him.
The court previously dismissed the case on Section 230 grounds and rejected the FOSTA workaround. Now, YouTube moved to dismiss the Third Amended Complaint, and the court again grants the motion to dismiss based on Section 230. Much of this very short opinion covers the same ground as the prior opinion, so read my earlier post for more details.
The allegations center on how Onision posted video content to his YouTube channels, how that content is said to have targeted and garnered underage audiences which gave him access to underage fans, and how YouTube derived ad revenue from the online traffic to Onision’s videos. In short, plaintiffs’ theory of liability would require Google and YouTube to act as a monitor of third-party content, which is precisely the sort of liability that Section 230 prohibits [cite to Doe v. Grindr]
The plaintiff again pointed to YouTube’s Partnership Program (YPP) and its revenue-share with posters. The court says the YPP didn’t create an agency relationship or partnership (despite the name…) between YouTube and the posters. As mentioned in my prior post, this court’s answer sidesteps the ambiguity about what’s left of the Ninth Circuit’s Gonzalez v. Google ruling, which indicated that Section 230 didn’t apply to revenue-share arrangements.
plaintiffs rely on allegations about YouTube’s general video-search algorithms, control over ad revenue generated from viewership of Onision’s content per the YPP agreement, and instances in which YouTube was notified via complaints that Onision was violating its terms of service. The claim is directly foreclosed by Grindr because these allegations, taken as true, show no more than that YouTube “provided a platform that facilitated the sharing of [videos] between users” and “merely turn[ed] a blind eye to the source of its revenue.” Plausible allegations that YouTube “generally benefitted from sex traffickers’ use of [its platform]” do not establish that YouTube’s “own conduct” violated section 1591
Case Citation: In re YouTube Trafficking Litigation, 2025 WL 1745759 (N.D. Cal. June 24, 2025)
