The company that built its fortune on keeping people engaged may soon discover what happens when a judge decides to stop scrolling.
A coalition of 29 state attorneys general opened their case against Meta Platforms on Tuesday in Oakland federal court, arguing that the parent company of Facebook and Instagram deliberately engineered its products to hook young users — some of them barely old enough to have finished elementary school. The trial, expected to last five to six weeks, is being overseen by United States District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.
A California lawyer representing the states told the court that Meta's own internal data had identified "millions" of 11- and 12-year-olds on Instagram, yet the company "did little to keep them off." Meta disputed that characterization. Paul Schmidt, a lawyer for the company, said an investigation found just over 100,000 accounts belonging to users in that age group — a number that, while large, is considerably smaller than "millions." Mr. Schmidt also argued that research had not established a clear causal link between social-media use and diminished adolescent wellbeing.
(One imagines the research department at Meta filing that finding under "Reassuring, Potentially.")
The states are seeking not merely financial penalties but structural changes to the platforms themselves: stronger age verification, limits on time spent online by younger users, and restrictions on features that have become as fundamental to the social-media experience as the logo — infinite scroll, autoplay video, push notifications, visible "like" counts, appearance-altering filters and recommendation algorithms.
Meta has estimated that its potential exposure could reach $1.4 trillion, a figure that approaches the company's entire market capitalization. The attorneys general have indicated that actual penalties sought would be closer to $200 billion, which is the sort of discount that still manages to concentrate the mind.
The case represents one of the most significant legal challenges yet to Meta's core business model. Whether Judge Gonzalez Rogers agrees that the scroll should have a bottom remains to be seen.
Original story published in campaignlive.com: "The lawsuits that could force Meta to redesign Facebook and Instagram | Campaign US"