A bipartisan group of 33 attorneys general are suing Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, over “addictive” features aimed at children, according to a complaint filed Tuesday in federal court.
In the lawsuit, the states claim that Meta allegedly violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and state consumer protection laws by making its platforms “addictive” and then lying about the repercussions of them on childrens’ mental health.
“While Meta consistently reassures parents, lawmakers, and users that its Social Media Platforms are suitable for young users and designed to promote their well-being, it continues to develop and implement features that it knows induce young users’ extended, addictive, and compulsive social media use,” the lawsuit read. The features it included in the lawsuit are the algorithms, the public display of likes, infinite scroll formats, among many others.
“We share the attorneys general’s commitment to providing teens with safe, positive experiences online, and have already introduced over 30 tools to support teens and their families,” a Meta spokesperson told NBC in a statement. “We’re disappointed that instead of working productively with companies across the industry to create clear, age-appropriate standards for the many apps teens use, the attorneys general have chosen this path.”
On X, formerly known as Twitter, Washington, D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb said that Meta’s features “lure in and addict kids.”
“This lawsuit seeks to end Meta’s exploitation of young people and remedy the damage it's done to an entire generation,” he added.
NEW: We’re suing Meta for endangering District youth.
— AG Brian Schwalb (@DCAttorneyGen) October 24, 2023
Meta designed Instagram with features that lure in and addict kids, putting profits over their well-being. This lawsuit seeks to end Meta’s exploitation of young people and remedy the damage it's done to an entire generation.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey said that Meta “knowingly designed and deployed harmful features” on its platforms.
Today, I joined a lawsuit suing Meta in federal court alleging the company knowingly designed and deployed harmful features on Instagram and its other social media platforms that purposefully addict children and teens.
— Patrick Morrisey (@MorriseyWV) October 24, 2023
We have been investigating this issue on various platforms…
In 2021, former Facebook employee Frances Haugen leaked internal documents from Meta. The Wall Street Journal then reported that some of the documents showed that “thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse.”