A woman alleges Discord and Instagram enabled child abuse rings to groom and blackmail her; the case could test Section 230 immunity for social media platforms.
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A woman who says she was groomed and blackmailed as a teenager by online child exploitation rings has sued Discord and Meta, alleging the companies gave predators "unfettered access" to her and failed to stop the abuse.
The anonymous plaintiff filed the lawsuit in San Francisco Superior Court in April. Her lawyers hope the case will become a "watershed moment" for holding social media platforms accountable for criminal activity on their services.
The suit names CVLT and 764, two groups the FBI says groom children online and blackmail them. A third group, Greggy's Cult, is also named. Multiple members of each have been arrested by law enforcement.
Discord and Meta declined to comment on the specific case. A Discord spokesperson said disrupting the 764 network is one of its top priorities and that it has been cracking down on the group since 2021. Discord said it works closely with law enforcement, has removed thousands of servers, and banned hundreds of thousands of users associated with 764 and its affiliates.
A Meta spokesperson said CVLT is banned from its platforms and that it has strict policies against child exploitation, suicide, and self-harm. Meta also said it has specialized teams, including former law enforcement and prosecutors, working with the FBI on the issue.
The bulk of the plaintiff's claims target Discord, "due to the stronger causal link between Discord's conduct and her injuries," her lawyers wrote. She also sued Meta because, she alleges, a CVLT member first contacted and groomed her on Instagram, which Meta owns.
The plaintiff's ordeal began at age 15, according to her complaint. A member of Greggy's Cult contacted her through a public Discord server. The New Mexico man, Zachary Dosch, allegedly persuaded her to send a video of herself masturbating and livestreamed it to other group members. Dosch pleaded guilty to federal charges of distributing child-sexual-abuse material in 2023. He and four other Greggy's Cult members were charged again in 2025 on allegations of extorting children. He pleaded not guilty. A lawyer for Dosch didn't respond to a request for comment.
At 17, after the plaintiff began posting on Instagram about her mental health struggles, another man contacted her on Instagram, the suit alleges. The lawsuit says he turned out to be Collin John Thomas Walker, a member of CVLT, a child exploitation group described as "Neo-Nazi" by the FBI. The lawsuit claims Walker spent months "love bombing" her before finding out her home address and threatening her.
Walker allegedly coerced the plaintiff into obtaining her sexually explicit photos, which he then sent around CVLT's Discord server. He also allegedly coerced her to carve his username into her body, burn herself with candle wax, and starve herself to stay attractive. His account remained active on Instagram throughout. Walker was later arrested and pleaded guilty to child exploitation charges in October 2025. A lawyer for Walker didn't respond to a request for comment.
The plaintiff's parents confiscated her phone and returned it when she turned 18. At that point, another online child abuse group called 764 recruited her on Discord, the suit said. She finally escaped by faking her own death. By the end of May 2022, she "escaped the online hell she had been living in," the lawsuit states.
U.S. law enforcement has arrested and charged multiple 764 members. The FBI said in a warning letter to parents in February that it's investigating more than 350 people tied to 764 and its affiliates.
The lawsuit alleges Discord and Meta's "permissive environments provided these predators with unfettered access, anonymity, and the ability to disseminate images and messages that deepened Plaintiff's trauma," resulting in a "cycle of fear, shame, and emotional despair." The plaintiff suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, permanent scars, and poor grades, her complaint says.
The case tests whether Section 230, the federal law shielding social media companies from user behavior, applies to such claims. Meta has moved to have the case bundled with social media addiction cases. Discord wants the case dismissed entirely, arguing that federal law shields it from liability for content posted by its users.
The suit follows other legal action against Discord over child predators. The states of Texas, Arkansas, New Jersey, and Nevada have each separately sued Discord since last year for allegedly failing to protect children online. Those lawsuits are all ongoing.
Earlier this year, the parents of 13-year-old Jay Taylor filed a wrongful death suit against Discord. Taylor died by suicide in 2022 after a 764 member allegedly pushed him toward it in a group chat. Discord seeks to move the case to private arbitration, citing its terms of service.
Meta was found liable in a child exploitation case in March. A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $375 million for, in part, exposing children to sexual predators. New Mexico's attorney general says Meta plans to appeal.
Julie Erickson, one of the lawyers representing the plaintiff, told Business Insider she hopes the lawsuit will pave the way for tech companies to be held accountable for child exploitation rings operating on their platforms. "We are hopeful that this is sort of a watershed moment," she said.
The plaintiff's case is ongoing.
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