As Meta fends off thousands of lawsuits over allegations that its social media platforms harm children’s mental health, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram faces its biggest challenge yet in a contentious court battle that begins Tuesday in California.
For Meta, the stakes are high — to the tune of some $1.4 trillion.
The company is headed to trial after four states — California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey — accused it in 2023 of designing algorithms that keep kids hooked to their social media feeds and coming back for more. The states also accuse the company of misleading the public about the social media platforms’ effects on young people and of violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. The federal children’s privacy law prohibits companies from collecting data about children under 13 without parental consent.
Ahead of the trial in the U.S. District Court in Oakland, California’s Democratic attorney general, Rob Bonta, accused Meta of “exploiting our most vulnerable residents to boost corporate profits.”
Along with violating the federal children’s privacy law, the lawsuit accuses Silicon Valley-based Meta of violating California laws against false advertising and unfair competition.
The backlash from state attorneys general is bipartisan. Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman, a Republican, equated the lawsuit to legal challenges in the 1990s against tobacco companies, with research suggesting social media use among young people is associated with heightened depression and anxiety, as well as other behavioral health issues including eating disorders. In one recent survey, more than a third of teens said they use social media “almost constantly.”
“This week, we’re in court with the largest consumer protection lawsuit in American history,” Coleman said in a news release. “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.”
Meta didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from Straight Arrow. A company spokesperson told NPR the states’ claims are limited and the financial demands are “vastly disproportionate” to their allegations.
“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 wrote. “We stand by our record of creating strong protections for teens, and look forward to making our case in court.”
As Straight Arrow reported in its recent series, Attention Thieves, social media companies have built their platforms to capture both the attention and time of their users, employing human psychology to hook and retain viewers. The companies say they are enabling human connection in ways that not long ago were not technologically possible.
Meta faces a wave of litigation
The lawsuit against Meta is part of a broader legal effort that seeks to hold social media companies accountable for their effects on children’s wellbeing.
Like other social media companies, Meta has free-speech rights under the First Amendment, as well as other protections granted by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. But the company has already faced major headwinds in court.
The situation has been brewing for years. In a 2021 expose based on internal Meta documents leaked by a whistleblower, The Wall Street Journal reported that the company knew its social media platforms harmed teens’ wellbeing but downplayed the risks to the public.
During a contentious congressional hearing in 2024, Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressed families directly and apologized to parents who said their children were harmed — and in some cases, died by suicide — because of the company’s algorithms.
“I’m sorry for everything you’ve all gone through,” Zuckerberg said at the time. “It’s terrible. No one should have to go through the things that your families have suffered.”
The trial in California comes on the heels of several recent court losses for Meta.
In a landmark court decision in March, a Los Angeles jury found that Meta and Google were negligent — and awarded a young woman $6 million in damages — for designing algorithms in ways executives knew kept kids hooked despite mental health risks.
The jury concluded the companies were to blame for the mental anguish experienced by the young woman, who used social media compulsively as a child.
In a separate legal ruling this month, a New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $567 million after a jury found the company failed to protect young people from child sexual exploitation on social media. The fines were in addition to the $375 million in civil penalties that a jury imposed on the company in March. With the verdict, New Mexico became the first state to prevail against a major technology company over its effects on children.
“The jury’s verdict is a historic victory for every child and family who has paid the price for Meta’s choice to put profits over kids’ safety,” New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez said in a media release. “Meta executives knew their products harmed children, disregarded warnings from their own employees and lied to the public about what they knew. Today the jury joined families, educators and child safety experts in saying enough is enough.”
Meta and other social media platforms have also faced lawsuits from school districts across the country, which allege the tech giants failed to provide adequate warnings to children about the effects of social media on their wellbeing.
Meta and Google have appealed the Los Angeles verdict. Meta has disputed the New Mexico allegations and said it will appeal that ruling as well.
