A coalition of states suing Meta Platforms over claims Facebook and Instagram were designed in ways that harmed young users' mental health will ​begin making its case on Tuesday in California federal court in a trial that could reshape some of the most popular ‌apps on the planet.Aug 18 (Reuters) - A coalition of states suing Meta Platforms (META.O), opens new tab over claims Facebook and Instagram were designed in ways that harmed young users' mental health will ​begin making its case on Tuesday in California federal court in a trial that could reshape some of the most popular ‌apps on the planet.Attorneys for Colorado, California, New Jersey and Kentucky, who are leading a bipartisan group of 29 states, will give their opening statements before an eight-person jury in Oakland that is serving expressly in an advisory capacity for U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who will ultimately decide the case.

The trial will test the four states’ allegations that Meta ​designed Facebook and Instagram to be addictive to children and teens and misled consumers about the safety of the platforms for young users. ​It will also address the claims of all 29 states accusing Meta of improperly collecting and using children’s personal data ⁠while they used the company’s platforms in violation of federal law.

Attorneys for Meta are expected to tell the jury that the company has made a ​huge effort to keep kids safe online. The company has argued that it has not made misleading statements about safety and the states have failed to present ​any evidence of actual harm to their residents.Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is expected to testify during the multiweek trial, as is Instagram head Adam Mosseri.
In terms of potential damages and implications for Meta, experts have said the trial is the biggest test yet of youth social media litigation and comes amid a broader reckoning across the ​globe over social media's effects on young users.
Meta has said the penalties could be as high as $1.4 trillion, near the company’s market cap of $1.5 trillion. The ​attorneys general have yet to specify what they are seeking in penalties, but said at a hearing last week that the amount could be closer to $200 billion.
The attorneys general ‌of Colorado, ⁠Kentucky, California and New Jersey are also asking the judge to issue an order forcing the company to implement age restrictions, eliminate infinite scroll and make other changes to its platforms nationwide.

In a statement ahead of the arguments, a Meta spokesperson said the states’ claims are unsubstantiated and the company stands by its record of creating strong protections for teens.

“The AGs offer no proof anyone in their states was misled, claim benign features like having an additional Instagram account ​somehow harmed their residents, and attempt ​to penalize Meta for industry-wide challenges ⁠like age verification,” the spokesperson said. “Rather than sticking to the facts or the law, the states have instead decided to chase an outlandish payout."

A MULTISTATE INVESTIGATION

The states' lawsuit, which was filed in 2023, stems from a multistate investigation into ​Instagram and Facebook's impact on young users. The investigation was announced following disclosures by Meta whistleblower Frances Haugen, who testified ​before a U.S. Senate ⁠committee in 2021 that the company knew its products could harm young users and how to make them safer, but chose not to make those changes in favor of pursuing higher profits.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) will be in an Oakland federal courtroom on Tuesday, defending itself against the 29 states that say it built Facebook and Instagram to addict children and then told parents the platforms were safe.

A bipartisan group of state attorneys general will attempt to convince the court that the social media giant knew its products were harmful. It goes to trial less than two weeks after a judge in New Mexico hit Meta with a nearly $1 billion judgment in a similar case.

The states' argument is that the addiction was designed in. They point to infinite scroll, likes, autoplay, algorithmic recommendations, and weak age controls. They also say Meta violated the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), a federal law that bars companies from collecting personal data on kids under 13 without a parent signing off.

Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers threw out most of Meta's attempt to get the case dismissed in April.

Meta denies wrongdoing and is leaning on Section 230, the federal law that generally shields internet platforms from being sued over what their users post. The company argues that its recommendation algorithms are protected editorial choices and that "social-media addiction" isn't a recognized medical diagnosis.

The case is part of a torrent of similar cases brought against the company, including a very similar case Meta lost in New Mexico court in which a jury found 75,000 violations of the state's consumer-protection laws and assessed a $375 million penalty. A judge then ruled that Meta's platforms amounted to a "public nuisance" and ordered another $567 million for a youth mental-health fund along with mandated product changes. Meta maintains its innocence here as well and is appealing all of it.

The states are expected to present a trove of internal documents and research from Meta, as well as testimony from former Meta employees and ⁠experts.
Meta and ​other social media companies like Snap Inc (SNAP.N), opens new tab, TikTok parent ByteDance and YouTube parent Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab are ​facing growing pressure from lawmakers and in the courts. The states' lawsuit is among thousands of cases filed against the companies by states, municipalities, school districts and individuals over allegations that their products ​harm young users.

Meta has been hit with successive losses in court over how its platforms have targeted and harmed young users, but a jury trial set to begin on Tuesday may pose the biggest threat yet to its operations.

The trial stems from a lawsuit filed in 2023 by 30 US states, including California and New York, in which they claim numerous violations of federal and state privacy laws for children.

Not only are the states seeking upwards of $1 trillion from Meta, they are demanding it make changes to Instagram and Facebook, including ending "like" counts and infinite scroll.

Should Meta ultimately lose a case of this scale, it could force fundamental changes to the way young people experience social media.

One state attorney general described the case as "the largest consumer protection lawsuit in American history".

"We'll show a jury that Meta concealed what it knew about the harm its products cause young people because looking away was more profitable," said Kentucky Attorney General (AG) Russell Coleman.

"AGs are in the perfect position to get this done. We did it with the Tobacco Settlement in the 1990s. We did it with the companies behind the opioid crisis. We'll do it again with Meta."

Kentucky and the other states suing Meta are asking for many more changes to the way Instagram and Facebook operate for young people, too.

They want Meta to:

  • implement a process of parental verification for teenage users
  • change its "dopamine-manipulating recommendation algorithms"
  • remove many image filters that change one's appearance in photos
  • end autoplay of video content
  • prohibit the creation of multiple accounts
  • end disappearing or "ephemeral" posts, such as Instagram Stories

All of these features are central to the current user experience on Meta's platforms.These features are also designed to keep users, including teenagers and children, on the platforms as often and for as long as possible, the states contend. They claim Meta even makes it difficult for young people to use the platform less, through things like frequent notifications designed to get young people back on the apps.By allegedly targeting child users, Meta "chose to exploit" young people in order to hook them on its platforms, so it could grow its user base and expand its business. Today, Meta's value on the stock market is about $1.5tn.Meta has consistently denied such claims."We strongly disagree with these allegations and are confident the evidence will show our longstanding commitment to supporting young people," a company spokeswoman said in a statement.The states are putting their claims to Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, a chief federal judge in California. She was the judge in the high-profile Elon Musk v Sam Altman trial and has built a reputation from the bench over the course of nearly 20 years for being incisive and direct.

In a recent ruling against Meta, a judge in New Mexico fined the company a collective $942m and ordered it to make changes similar to those that the additional states are now demanding.

Judge Bryan Biedscheid's ordered changes include the elimination on Instagram and Facebook of like counts for users younger than 18, a ban on teenagers sending or receiving nudity through the platforms, and limiting push notifications from the apps to certain hours of the day.

The judge also declared Meta a "public nuisance" akin to a factory that was polluting the air people breathe, causing "harmful effects" that impacted an entire population. Meta said it would appeal against the ruling.

While Judge Biedscheid's order only demands Meta make changes in New Mexico, should the 30 states prevail in their separate lawsuit against Meta, it would almost certainly need to enact platform changes across the US.

The states involved in the lawsuit represent nearly two-thirds of the country's population.

If Meta did enact such changes, it would mark a significant alteration to the experience of its platforms.

But Kelly Stonelake, a former Meta executive turned whistleblower and advocate for children's online safety, told the BBC's Today programme she was unsure if it would lead to any meaningful change to decision-making at the top.

"I think there is a huge amount of cognitive dissonance and rationalisation that has to exist in order to be making decisions like they're making now, despite the evidence that makes very clear those decisions are harming vulnerable people," she said.

There were also questions to be asked about how the sum of its potential losses had been calculated, Stonelake added.

"Like" counts, for instance, have been part of Meta since its early years, when it was still called Facebook and that was its only platform.

Today, likes are omnipresent on social media platforms. It is the main way in which people engage with text, photos and videos they see online.

Yet, likes are increasingly viewed as a way to foster negative feelings, particularly among young people.

Kaley, a young woman who prevailed in her lawsuit against Meta earlier this year, described during court testimony how she created dozens of accounts on YouTube and Instagram.

She would use the system of accounts to create likes on her own posts, hoping to drive engagement with other users and her own feelings of validation and self-worth. Kaley was only nine years old at the time. She said she remembered feeling depressed, something she was later diagnosed with, aged 10.

Research over the last several years has shown that engagement metrics such as like counts can drive feelings of rejection and depression in teenagers.

In the states' lawsuit against Meta, in which the company said it has handed over more than 2 million documents, lawyers pointed to Meta's own research that showed like counts drove "social comparison", or the mental act of marking one's self worth against images of someone else.

That social comparison driven by Instagram was linked to "increased loneliness, worse body image, and negative mood or affect", according to Meta's internal research.

As Judge Biedscheid put it in his order, which was the first time a social media company has been deemed a "public nuisance", the way Meta's platforms have operated for over a decade has been part of a growing "youth mental health crisis" in New Mexico and elsewhere.

Now, attorneys from 30 more states will be pushing Judge Gonzalez Rogers to reach the same conclusion.

Posted on 2026/08/18 04:01 PM