Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in a Los Angeles court Wednesday about accusations that Instagram is exploiting young people and harming their mental health. His company is on trial, alongside Google, in a civil suit seen as a test case for holding tech companies to account for social ills blamed on their products, particularly among young users.
The plaintiff is a 20-year-old woman who has said she became addicted to Instagram (owned by Meta) and YouTube (owned by Google) as an adolescent and that her mental health suffered severely as a result. Meta has argued that her mental health struggles were caused by other factors, including family circumstances. Two other social media platforms, Snapchat and TikTok, settled for undisclosed amounts before the trial began.
Mr. Zuckerberg was questioned on the stand by Mark Lanier, the plaintiff’s lawyer, about Instagram’s controls on children under 13 using the platform. The app requires users to be 13 or older but didn’t start asking new users to input a birthdate until 2019. Mr. Zuckerberg defended its policy as appropriate. (The plaintiff has said she began using Instagram aged 9.)
Why We Wrote This
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in a trial that’s weighing a hot issue for both U.S. families and tech companies – whether social media is designed to be addictive and poses special risks for teenagers.
“I don’t think we identified every single person who tried to get around [age] restrictions, but you’re implying we weren’t trying to work on it and that’s not true,” he said, according to news reports from the courtroom.
Mr. Lanier also pressed Mr. Zuckerberg about goals set by Meta, the parent company, to maximize the time users spent on Instagram. Mr. Zuckerberg said its policy had evolved from time goals to the “utility and value” of the platform. He said, “There’s a basic assumption I have that if something is valuable, then people will do it more.”
The lawsuit tries to sidestep the broad protections that tech platforms enjoy against being sued for user-created content. Instead of arguing that Instagram was liable for harmful content, it accuses the company of designing an addictive app it knew could prove harmful for teenage girls.
If Instagram/Meta loses the case, it could prove momentous for social-media companies. They face a wave of lawsuits that allege that their platforms are deliberately hooking and harming young users. Separately, Meta has been sued by New Mexico’s state government for allegedly not stopping online predators targeting minors using Instagram. Meta denies the allegation.
Last week Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, testified in the Los Angeles trial. He defended the company and said it weighed “different considerations” in vetting Instagram features, which include photo filters that mimic the effects of plastic surgery. Instagram had an internal debate about whether to permit these filters, according to court documents, before allowing them to be used. He also asserted in court that social media isn’t “clinically” addictive.
Australia recently became the first country to ban social-media access for under-16s. Several European countries have weighed similar legal restrictions.
Matthew Bergman, a plaintiffs’ attorney, said in a statement that Meta’s own safety teams understood the dangers its platforms posed, and that Mr. Zuckerberg’s testimony “carries profound weight” for families who have been waiting for their voices to be heard.
Parents who say their children’s mental health was harmed by social media gathered outside the courtroom before Mr. Zuckerberg arrived. He has previously been quizzed about child safety on his platforms during congressional hearings, but this was the first time that he’d been called to testify in a courtroom.
