29 US States vs Meta

 

The sight of Mark Zuckerberg testifying in defense of his tech platforms has become so familiar in recent years, it feels like a social media meme in itself. But when Meta’s chief executive takes the stand in the coming weeks, as part of a landmark trial that began in California on Tuesday, he won’t be able to brush it off as just another legal or congressional inconvenience. As our global technology reporter Aisha Down wrote, the case could prove as consequential for big tech as the settlement that brought big tobacco to heel in the 1990s.

This is partly because of the sheer size of the damages being sought. The 29 US states that brought this week’s case against Meta are seeking up to $200bn (£146bn), alleging that the owner of Facebook and Instagram deliberately designed addictive products that led to young people being harmed, as well as violating child privacy laws. Meta denies all allegations.

More fundamentally, the case reflects a broader shift in efforts to hold social media companies to account, with the focus on addictiveness by design and young people’s wellbeing proving a gamechanger. It comes as countries including the UK and France have followed Australia’s lead in moving to ban social media for children under 16. Last month, the EU pledged its own ban.

Tech companies have so far managed to largely avoid responsibility for the content posted on their social networks by claiming that they are platforms rather than publishers. 

This distinction hasn’t just sheltered them from legal liabilities, it has arguably helped shape the world we live in today, with its crises of disinformation, social division and toxic discourse. But by focusing on the addictiveness of those platforms rather than the content, this week’s federal lawsuit helps to flip the script.

As Dara Kerr reported for us on Wednesday, the trial’s first witness, former Meta safety engineer Arturo Béjar, discussed potentially addictive features such as infinite scrolling.

The case is just one of many the Guardian has been reporting on. In March, a Los Angeles jury found both Meta and Google-owned YouTube liable for deliberately designing addictive products that had affected the mental health of a single young claimant. 

A New Mexico court recently ordered Meta to pay a total of $942bn after a jury found it was aware of child sexual exploitation on its platforms and failed to prevent it. That lawsuit cited a 2023 Guardian investigation that exposed child sex trafficking on Facebook and Instagram. 

The reporter Katie McQue has recounted how it took a lot of perseverance before the full impact of our investigation became clear. Meta says it plans to appeal against the ruling. Meanwhile, thousands of coordinated cases have been filed in a California state court against Meta, YouTube, TikTok and Snap.

This week, Johana Bhuiyan reported on how Meta has tapped an army of influencers to promote its safety tools for teens. Some of its other defensive strategies have felt less benevolent. For instance, we have been following allegations that Meta has sought to punish the whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams, author of the memoir Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism, which contains claims about its platforms’ negative impacts on teenagers. An order secured by Meta prevents Wynn-Williams from speaking about her book and she risks a fine every time if she breaches it.

Another Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, was behind the 2021 leak of a cache of damaging internal documents that contained revelations about Instagram’s impact on the mental health and wellbeing of teenage girls. Aaron Sorkin’s forthcoming film is partly based on the leak, starring Jeremy Strong as Zuckerberg. Its title, The Social Reckoning, certainly speaks to the moment.

-Owen Gibson, The Guardian