A person uses an app on their phone while driving. The person is distracted while using that app. As a result of using the app, the person collides with another car, injuring a third party. In this scenario, at first glance, the idea of holding the app developer liable for the third party’s injuries seems tenuous at best. After all, would a writer be liable in this scenario if the person was distracted by a really enthralling book rather than a phone app? But in 2022, the Georgia Supreme Court held that app developers like Snapchat could be liable under the same statutory and common law product liability standards as more traditional manufacturers are.
Wentworth and Karen Maynard were driving together at 10:15 P.M. in Clayton County, County. At the same time, 19 year old Christal McGee and two friends were speeding at upwards of 107 miles per hour until they crashed into the rear of the Maynards’ vehicle. At the time of the wreck, McGee was using Snapchat, a popular social media app that allows users to send quick photos and videos to friends. Snapchat had previously implemented a feature called a “Speed Filter.” The filter would add an overlay to your photo or video that displayed the speed at which you were traveling. McGee, allegedly, was attempting to get her speed to over 100 miles per hour so she could post it on Snapchat for her friends to see.
The Maynards alleged that Snapchat had negligently designed the Speed Filter as it encouraged reasonably foreseeable dangerous behaviors. They argued that Snapchat had a duty of ordinary care when designing their app and that they breached that duty when designing and implementing the Speed Filter. Furthermore, although Snapchat included a disclaimer telling users to not use the filter while driving, the Maynards argue this was inadequate and knowingly ineffective.
The trial court then granted Snapchat’s motion to dismiss on the grounds that (1) Snapchat owed no legal duty to Plaintiffs to design products to prevent McGee from driving dangerously or to control her behavior, and (2) Plaintiffs could not establish proximate cause. The Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal on the basis of Snapchat owing no duty. Plaintiffs then appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court which reversed and remanded the Court of Appeals’ decision. On remand, the Court of Appeals reversed the granting of the motion to dismiss on Snapchat’s remaining arguments.
The Supreme Court disagreed with the Court of Appeals majority’s opinion that a manufacturer’s duty to use reasonable care in designing a product does not extend to the intentional misuse of a product in a tortious way by a third party. The Court held simply that regardless of how a product is being used, a manufacturer may owe a design duty to an injured party. The Court of Appeals majority also erred in holding that a manufacturer can never owe a design duty to an injured person if that person was injured by a third party’s use of its product.
The Plaintiffs alleged that Snapchat knew its users were driving in excess of 100 miles per hour in order to record high speeds in their posts. They alleged that Defendant McGee told her friends of her plan to speed in excess of 100 miles per hour in order to post it to Snapchat. They alleged that Snapchat incentivized misuse the product and speed. And they alleged that they were injured as a result of the negligence of Snapchat and McGee. In short, the Supreme Court held that Plaintiffs’ claims were sufficiently pled under Georgia’s laws regarding products liability, duty, and causation to avoid dismissal.
While, as stated before, on first glance, the idea that an app developer could be held liable for developing an app, a review of the Georgia Supreme Court’s decision shows that its rationale and supporting theory is well-established and reasonable considering Georgia statutory and common law.
Should we expect that Maynard will trigger a wave of successful products liability lawsuits against phone app developers in Georgia and across the country? Probably not. The filter at issue in Maynard seemed to be almost tailor-made for incurring liability as it was so intentionally designed to not only be used while driving, but obviously would encourage reckless or impressionable people to speed as much as possible. Major app developers like Snapchat, Instagram (Meta), Twitter, and TikTok, and more have most likely taken Maynard as a cautionary tale and will avoid creating such obviously-dangerous features within their products. However, many popular apps begin as small startups run by young, inexperienced developers who are more focused on increasing their userbase than on potential legal liabilities. These hypothetical young developers know little-to-nothing about products liability much less have knowledge of Maynard v. Snapchat, Inc. It is through these young startups that a products liability-invoking lawsuit may be seen again.
However, even if a developer is not designing a feature in an app that is so obviously encouraging dangerous behavior, developers, both for consumer-facing and industry-facing applications, should keep Maynard in the back of their minds while designing features and avoid features that encourage dangerous behaviors like speeding or distracted driving even if the intent behind the feature is innocent and innocuous.