Sports betting apps prod and entice fans as gambling exacts a growing financial toll

September 20, 2026 / 9:08 AM EDT / CBS News

When Meta agreed last month to pay states $17.1 billion in penalties and make major changes to address claims that its platforms are addictive, attorney Jennifer Hoekstra already had her eyes set on the next frontier in the consumer backlash to Big Tech — sports betting.

Hoekstra, a Florida attorney whose firm was involved in an earlier win in court against Meta, recently filed a series of 15 lawsuits against the two biggest sports gambling apps in the country, FanDuel and DraftKings. The cases follow a similar legal theory: that gambling apps were designed to addict.

"I represent individuals who have essentially lost their houses and their spouses and their kids over this," Hoekstra told CBS News. "It's the same type of workflow, the same type of notifications. It's almost as if it's the same type of addiction."

At a time when online sports gambling has exploded in popularity — with the amount wagered reaching $167 billion last year, according to the American Gaming Association — there are mounting concerns about the financial toll of all that betting.

One UCLA study published earlier this year found that in states that…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/entertainment/