Meta Child-Safety Trial Pits Profit Claims Against Its Safety Defense

Meta Child-Safety Trial Pits Profit Claims Against Its Safety Defense
Meta’s federal child-safety trial has opened with a stark question for jurors: did the company build Facebook and Instagram around young users’ vulnerabilities, or is it being punished for an imperfect effort to address a much wider social problem?

On Tuesday, California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey began their case in Oakland, accusing Meta of knowingly designing addictive features for children, concealing harms and collecting data from users under 13 without parental consent. The four states are part of a broader 2023 action brought by 29 attorneys general; the remaining cases will be tried later.

In opening arguments, California deputy attorney general Megan O’Neill said Meta had studied children’s sensitivity to rewards, social feedback and impulse control, then used that knowledge to keep them engaged. “Kids are the product,” she told the eight-member jury.

The states are seeking billions of dollars and fundamental changes to Facebook and Instagram. Outside the courthouse, parents and child-safety advocates pressed for accountability, while former Meta engineering director Arturo Béjar testified that proposed protections for harmful content were diluted until they “didn’t make a difference.”

Meta does not dispute that some under-13s evade its age rules, that teens can struggle to manage their time online, or that harmful material appears on its services. But its lawyer, Paul Schmidt, argued the case will show sustained work to improve safety—not a company indifferent to the problem. “Much of this lawsuit is about the government attorneys and their witnesses saying in trying to improve, we’d do it a little differently,” Schmidt said.

By Wednesday, Béjar’s testimony sharpened the clash. He said Instagram adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach to children below its minimum age, despite what he described as common internal knowledge that they were using the app. He testified that product staff were chiefly judged on user numbers and time spent online: “In that context, safety was an afterthought.”

Meta rejects those allegations and says the evidence will demonstrate its responsibility to work with teens and parents. The six-week trial is expected to include testimony from CEO Mark Zuckerberg; if Meta loses, the court will determine damages and potential remedies.

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