ANTISOCIAL MEDIA: Unsealed complaint says Meta ‘coveted’ under-13s and deceives the public about age enforcement.
The newly unsealed complaint, filed on Wednesday, reveals arguments that were previously redacted when attorneys generals from across the US first hit Meta with the lawsuit last month in the California federal court. It alleges the presence of under-13s is an “open secret” at Meta. While the policies on Facebook and Instagram state a person must be at least 13 years old to sign up, children can easily lie about their age — something the lawsuit says Meta is well aware of, and has done little to stop. Instead, when Meta “received over 1.1 million reports of under-13 users on Instagram” from 2019-2023, it “disabled only a fraction of those accounts and routinely continued to collect children’s data without parental consent,” the complaint says.
Meta “routinely violates” the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA) by targeting children and collecting their information without parental consent, according to the complaint. The lawsuit also argues that Meta’s platforms manipulate young users into spending unhealthy amounts of time on the apps, promote body dysmorphia and expose them to potentially harmful content. When the lawsuit was first filed in October, a Meta spokesperson said the company was “disappointed” over the chosen course of action, stating, “We share the attorneys general’s commitment to providing teens with safe, positive experiences online.”
Meta earlier this month published a blog post calling for federal legislation to put more responsibility on parents when it comes to kids’ app downloads. Meta’s global head of safety, Antigone Davis, proposed a requirement for parents to have approval power over downloads for kids under the age of 16.
Melissa and I have never let our boys install social media apps (or any other apps without permission) and now that our oldest is turning 18, here’s to hoping he developed the good sense not to bother just because his permissions are relaxed.
Related? Russia puts the spokesman for Facebook owner Meta on a wanted list.