US trial: Meta hooked kids on FB, Instagram

OAKLAND – Meta knowingly hooked and exploited children, a US federal court heard on Tuesday in a trial against the social media giant on charges that it deliberately made Instagram and Facebook addictive to young users.

In what many experts have called social media’s “big tobacco moment,” a coalition of states is asking that Meta be penalized by around $200 billion for designing products addictive to children.

The states are intervening where “Congress failed to act,” Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said on Tuesday afternoon during a press conference, noting that – like landmark cases against tobacco companies from decades past – this case, too, involved “public health and, in some cases, marketing to kids that hurt kids.”

During opening statements, California prosecutor Megan O’Neill painted Meta’s business model as one intended to “hook the users, hold them for as long as they can, harvest their data and then hide the truth from the public.”

Meta “exploited how kids’ brains work,” O’Neill said.

Meta’s lawyer, Paul Schmidt, acknowledged that some users had negative experiences on the apps, but argued that the company had “tried to come up with tools to help them.”

Before the trial began, the company denied the allegations, insisting it had worked with parents, experts and law enforcement to incorporate safeguards for children.

Former Meta engineering director Arturo Bejar testified that during Facebook’s early years, “the goal was to be able to get things into the hands of users as fast as possible, which meant that a lot of the time, safety or security was an afterthought.”

Days before the trial, Meta attempted to block Bejar from testifying, a move which the judge denied.

This is not the first case seeking to hold tech companies, including Meta, accountable for these types of issues, but it could become one of the most consequential if it forces Meta to make sweeping changes.

Activists, including mothers of children they say were driven to suicide by their social media usage, rallied outside court.

One mother, Lori Schott, called out Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram head Adam Mosseri, saying they “built one of those most powerful and richest companies in the world... But power does not excuse harm.”

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