On March 28, schools in Canada simultaneously joined a legal battle against big technology companies (Big Tech), accordingly filing a lawsuit in court denouncing these social media platforms. harms the psychological health and affects the learning of children in this country.
According to a Vietnam News Agency correspondent in Canada, four major education departments in Ontario have filed complaints with the Provincial Court. In the lawsuit, the school boards in Toronto, Ottawa and Peel Region accuse "Big Tech" companies such as Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, ByteDance, which owns TikTok, and Snap Inc. Snapchat owners engage in exploitative business practices, seeking to maximize profits at the risk of harming the mental health and well-being of students.
The lawsuit states that the addictive nature of social media forces teachers to spend more time in class to help students focus on their lessons. Mandatory use of social media platforms in teaching also strains the already limited resources of education departments as schools require additional health staffing and programming. spirit; must allocate additional personnel to deal with aggressive behavior or cyberbullying incidents; Information technology services and cybersecurity costs also increased. The plaintiffs sought compensation totaling about 4,5 billion CAD (more than 3,3 billion USD) and asked “Big Tech” to establish redesign the product to ensure safety for students.
Spokespeople for Meta and ByteDance have not officially commented on this lawsuit, while a spokesperson for Snap said that the Snapchat platform is intentionally designed to be different from other social media platforms, helping people Users can communicate better with friends or relatives.
The use of social media by children and adolescents is a widely discussed topic among parents, policy makers and education workers. In Canada, there is increasing concern about the risk of social media platforms being a place for cyberbullying to spread, leading to disrupted sleep, hindering brain development and young people's ability to concentrate.
Results of a recent survey from the Center for Addiction and Mental Health showed that 91% of students in grades 7 to 12 use social networks daily and more than 30% of this group spend 5 hours or more a day. for social networks. According to Canadian education authorities, about half of students in Ontario do not get enough sleep, partly due to being attracted to these platforms. Psychological stress and physical disorders also occur frequently, causing schools to spend millions of CAD to hire social workers, psychological counselors and other staff.
According to VNA
