The first of the federal social media addiction trials began in Oakland, California this week, with four state attorneys general accusing Meta of deliberately addicting children to social media.
The attorneys general of California, Kentucky, Colorado and New Jersey alleged Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram:
“Created a business model focused on maximizing young users’ time on its platforms.”
“Employs harmful and psychologically manipulative platform features while misleading the public about the safety of those features.”
“Publishes reports purporting to show misleadingly low rates of user harms.”
“Refuses to address those harms while continuing to conceal and downplay its platforms’ adverse effects.”
This alleged bad behavior, the states claim, violates their respective consumer protection laws and the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which prohibits companies from collecting children’s online data without parents’ permission.
Oral arguments for the case began in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Tuesday.
“Hook the users; hold them for as long as they can; harvest their data; hide the truth from the public when making public statements,” Megan O’Neill, a deputy attorney general for the California Department of Justice, described the social media company’s alleged tactics.
“Meta’s business model worked especially well for kids,” she hammered home.
If Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers rules in the states’ favor, Meta could have to pay as much as $200 billion in damages — nearly a fifth of the company’s current value.
The states’ case against Meta, which California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed in October 2023, began in 2021 as a nationwide investigation into the effect of Facebook and Instagram on minors.
“Our bipartisan investigation has arrived at a solemn conclusion,” Bonta wrote in a press release announcing the suit. “Meta has been harming our children and teens, cultivating addiction to boost corporate profits.”
More than 33 states joined the original filing, which remains heavily redacted. Judge Gonzalez Rogers selected evidence from California, Colorado, New Jersey and Kentucky to appear in the trial.
The case is the first in a series of federal bellwether cases, which are used to test novel legal theories. The question is whether a federal court can hold Meta liable for the damaging, addictive design of its social media platforms.
Until recently, no court at any level had ruled on this question. This year, however, juries in California and New Mexico state courts penalized Meta and YouTube for creating products which harmed minors.
A Los Angeles jury in March found Meta and YouTube’s addictive social media platforms caused a young woman to experience sextortion, depression, anxiety and body image issues.
A New Mexico jury ordered Meta to pay $375 million for endangering children on Facebook and Instagram. This month, Judge Bryan Biedscheid ordered the company pay another $567 million into an abatement fund for New Mexicans harmed by the platforms.
The judge further ordered Meta adopt new safety features for New Mexico minors, including:
Limiting them to 90 hours on the platforms or less per month.
Shutting off push-notifications overnight and during school hours.
Requiring parental consent before minors can see how many likes their posts receive.
Blurring suspected nude images.
Preventing Meta chatbots from conducting sexual interactions with minors.
Meta has already suffered some early setbacks in its battle against California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey. The social media giant tried to get the case thrown out under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which grants online content forums like Facebook and Instagram legal immunity for content posted to their platform.
But the once bulletproof legal strategy failed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied the company’s request earlier this month.
Meta also tried to prevent its former safety officer turned whistleblower, Arturo Béjar, from testifying against it. Judge Gonzalez Rogers likewise denied that request, and Béjar took the stand on Tuesday and Wednesday this week.
Béjar worked two stints for Meta totaling eight years. He returned to the company in 2019 after his own daughter received unwanted, sexually explicit photos over Instagram.
He left the company in 2021 after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri and other top executives repeatedly ignored his suggestions to improve safety for young people.
“I think they [the executives] really care about making people think that they care, but I think in practice they don’t care,” Béjar testified in February in New Mexico’s state trial against Meta.
“Caring is the moment you become aware of something, you engage with it, you understand it, you work on it, you do things that make it better.”
In this week’s testimony, Béjar revealed he met with Zuckerberg to inform him of problems with Facebook and Instagram an estimated 100 times. At these meetings, Béjar said he told the CEO the platforms promoted violent and graphic content and content from sexual predators to children.
Yet Zuckerberg and his higher-ups never meaningfully addressed these problems, he claimed. Sometimes, they never responded to his emails.
Béjar also bolstered pieces of the states’ case alleging Meta misled the public and made money off children’s addiction.
“I felt that he created a false and misleading impression of Facebook’s commitment to young people,” Béjar admitted.
In 2021, Béjar conducted his own survey of more than 237,000 Instagram users between 13 and 15 years old. One in three reported witnessing cyberbullying. One in 10 said they, themselves, experienced bullying online. One in five reported seeing explicit images.
Still, Béjar said the company never took meaningful steps to correct the problems. Meanwhile, habit-forming features like infinite scroll made it buckets of cash.
“On scroll, the more views you have, the more ads you sell, the more revenue you make,” he explained.
The jury and judge must decide whether the states’ evidence proves Meta designed its products to addict children. But Meta does not have to be legally guilty to be dangerous for children.
A growing mountain of evidence shows social media is, at best, detrimental to children’s mental health. At worst, it makes them easy targets for all kinds of internet predators.
Social media is not a safe place for children. Parents should seriously consider keeping their children off it.
To read more of the Daily Citizen’s reporting on the effects of social media on children, read the articles linked below.
Additional Articles and Resources
New Mexico Accuses Meta of Egregious Harm to Children in Court Case
Social Media Addiction Suits got to Trial — Here’s What You Need to Know
Instagram’s Sextortion Safety Measures — Too Little, Too Late?
Key Takeaways From Zuckerberg’s Tell-All
Zuckerberg Implicated in Meta’s Failures to Protect Children
Instagram Content Restrictions Don’t Work, Tests Show
Surgeon General Recommends Warning on Social Media Platforms
Horrifying Instagram Investigation Indicts Modern Parenting
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