Lawsuit asks if Facebook users can control their feeds using external tools

Do social media users have the right to control what they see or don’t see on their feeds?

A lawsuit filed against Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. is arguing that a federal law often used to shield internet companies from liability also allows people to use external tools to take control of their feed even if that means shutting it off entirely.

The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Meta Platforms on behalf of an Amherst professor who wants to release a tool that enables users to unfollow all the content fed to them by Facebook’s algorithm.