Delaware Court Distinguishes Between Negligent Outcomes and Negligent Actions

In Hartford Cas. Ins. Co. v. Instagram, LLC, No. N24C-11-010-SKR CCLD, 2026 Del. Super. LEXIS 95, (Super. Ct. Feb. 27, 2026), a Delaware Superior Court determined that insurers had no duty to defend thousands of lawsuits against Meta (the company behind Facebook and Instragram) that had been consolidated into two proceedings. Plaintiffs generally alleged that Meta (1) designed its platforms to maximize engagement by exploiting psychological vulnerabilities and embedding addictive features into the platforms; and (2) intentionally targeted minors with these design choices.

Purportedly applying California law, the court agreed with the insurers that there was no alleged “accident” to trigger coverage under the “Occurrence” based policies since the underlying pleadings all framed Meta’s actions in terms of intentional conduct. The court reached this conclusion despite the inclusion of multiple “Negligence” causes of action because “while the outcome is framed as negligence, the underlying act—creating and deploying the platforms—was intentional.” Id. at *44. The court’s analysis is flawed for two primary reasons.  

First, California law recognizes that alleged scienter cannot be taken at face value. KM Strategic Mgmt., LLC v. Am. Cas. Co. of Reading, PA, 156 F. Supp. 3d 1154, 1170 (C.D. Cal. 2015) (“‘An insurer does not meet its burden of establishing an exclusion’s application by pointing to unproven and disputed allegations in the very complaint it is called upon to defend.’”) Though the KM Strategic court was addressing an exclusion, there is no distinction in how to analyze an exclusion versus any other limitation on coverage. Pennsylvania Gen. Ins. Co. v. Am. Safety Indem. Co., 185 Cal. App. 4th 1515, 1526–27 (2010) (“When construing an insurance policy, we must resolve ambiguities in coverage clauses most broadly in favor of coverage, and we concomitantly must narrowly construe exclusions and limitations on coverage.”) (emphasis added) This is reinforced by many courts’ acknowledgement that pleadings are often crafted for strategic purposes. Hudson Ins. Co. v. Colony Ins. Co., 624 F.3d 1264, 1269 (9th Cir. (Cal.) 2010).  

Second, the court did not address recent developments in coverage law determining that an“Occurrence” can be reckless conduct. Aloha Petroleum, Ltd. v. Nat'l Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, 155 Haw. 108, 121 (2024) (“[I]f we ruled that recklessness is not an “accident,” we risk inviting duty-to-defend litigation due to the possibly fine-grained distinction between a policyholder's recklessness and negligence. This alternative view, which was not analyzed by the Instagram court, prevents it from being used as precedent against any similar arguments that the definition of “accident” should be expanded to encompass reckless conduct. Rosen v. State Farm Gen. Ins. Co., 30 Cal. 4th 1070, 1076 (2003) (“‘It is a well-established rule that an opinion is only authority for those issues actually considered or decided.’”)