Snapchat Sued For Facilitating 107 MPH Car Crash (patch.com)

Posted by msmash on Thursday May 5, 2016 @05:30AM from the technology-facilitating-damage dept.

An anonymous reader writes: A Georgia couple is suing Snapchat, a popular instant messaging and photo sharing app, after a car accident last year seriously injured the husband, leaving him permanently brain damaged. According to media reports, Wentworth Maynard, the victim, was driving in a 55-mile-per-hour zone when 18-year-old Christal McGee crashed into him traveling at 107 miles per hour. McGee, according to lawsuits, was attempting to use Snapchat's "speed filter" -- a feature that overlays the speed one is traveling on a picture. "Snapchat's speed filter facilitated McGee's excessive speeding," reads the lawsuit. "McGee was motivated to drive at an excessive speed in order to obtain recognition through Snapchat by the means of a Snapchat 'trophy.'"

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Hmm by hondo77 · 2016-05-05 05:36 · Score: 5, Interesting

It does make you wonder what Snapchat was thinking with this feature. Did nobody anticipate that jerks would drive crazy speeds because of this thing?

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Re:not so fast... by jklovanc · 2016-05-05 05:53 · Score: 4, Interesting

Would you hold Snapcat liable if they recorded the surrounding temperature and someone tried to maximize it by sitting in an enclosed car in the hot sun and died? All Snapchat did was to record a readily available piece of GPS data. It is the fault of the driver that she tried to maximize it. Snapchat does not have a "speed trophy". They even show a warning not to use Snapchat while driving.