A state Supreme Court justice is allowing a lawsuit stemming from the Buffalo mass shooting in May 2022 against multiple social media platforms to move forward.

Families of those killed in the attack filed a civil suit against platforms including Meta, Instagram, 4chan and Twitch, alleging hateful and extremist content on their sites radicalized the shooter.

Attorneys for the social media companies argued they only provided a platform for third-party content, for which they weren’t liable.

The judge found it’s plausible that the third-party content could be considered a product provided by those sites, meaning the companies could be held liable under New York's Consumer Protection laws. 

That means the court case will move forward to the discovery phase, although it could still be dismissed if the social media platforms can prove their content algorithms are not products.