Outside a federal courthouse in Oakland on Tuesday, grieving parents held photos of their children as Meta went before a judge in a closely watched trial over claims that the company knowingly made social media addictive for minors.
The powerful display unfolded as opening statements began inside, where attorneys for 29 states, including California, accused Meta of building Facebook and Instagram to maximize young users’ engagement while downplaying or misrepresenting the dangers those platforms posed.
Several mothers stood behind a large white banner printed with the names of nearly 600 children advocates say were harmed by social media, among them 11-year-old Giovanni and 13-year-old Bubba, according to the AP.
One of the parents gathered at the courthouse was Mary Rodee, whose 15-year-old son, Riley Basford, died by suicide in 2021 after she said he was targeted by a predator on Facebook.
“They call it spontaneous suicide,” Rodee told Reuters. “I call it what it was, the predictable outcome of a system that protects corporations instead of children.”
Also present was the mother of 14-year-old Alexander Neville, who died after taking fentanyl. She has said her son was deceived by a drug dealer he encountered on Snapchat.
The courthouse rally also drew Shannon Heacock, a Kentucky mother whose 17-year-old son, Elijah, died by suicide after becoming the target of a sextortion scheme. Heacock said predators tracked her son from TikTok to Instagram and exploited details from his online presence to learn about him.
“This wasn’t an accident,” Heacock said of her son’s death. “My son did not take his life. My son was killed.”
“We want Meta, in short, to stop hurting our kids, stop knowingly hurting our kids, stop using features that you know create mental health harms to kids,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta told NPR.
Inside the courtroom, California Deputy Attorney General Megan O’Neill told the eight-person jury that Meta’s business model was to “hook the users, hold them for as long as they can, harvest their data, and then hide the truth from the public.”
“It worked especially well for kids,” O’Neill added. “Meta needed kids, and it needed to reassure the people who cared about those kids that the kids are safe.”
Meta pushed back hard, arguing there is no clear evidence that social media use causes poor well-being among adolescents.
Meta attorney Paul Schmidt said there was “no dispute” that some users struggle with social media, but argued the company does not believe its products are dangerous.
“They don’t believe they’re going to do well if people don’t like their service,” Schmidt said.
The case could have massive consequences for Meta, with the company warning that penalties could reach as high as $1.4 trillion if it loses.
The states are also seeking sweeping changes to Facebook and Instagram, including eliminating likes and infinite scrolling, imposing time limits on younger users and enforcing restrictions designed to keep children under 13 off the platforms.
Former Meta safety engineer Arturo Bejar, the states’ first witness, testified that “move fast and break things” was a mantra at the company and that safety was sometimes an afterthought.
“Many products were shipped into the world,” including Reels, “and safety was not a consideration in how it was initially deployed,” Bejar said.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram chief Adam Mosseri are expected to testify during the trial, which is scheduled to last six weeks.
