Dozens of states sue Meta over social media 'profoundly altered' mental, social realities of American youth

Dozens of states are suing Meta, alleging its platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, have "profoundly altered the psychological and social realities of a generation of young Americans." 

The 228-page complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California claims that Meta’s business model specifically targets young users, monetizing their attention through data harvesting and targeting advertising and deploying features to prolong their time on social media for profit. 

"Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies to entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens," the complaint says. "Its motive is profit, and in seeking to maximize its financial gains, Meta has repeatedly misled the public about the substantial dangers of its Social Media Platforms. It has concealed the ways in which these Platforms exploit and manipulate its most vulnerable consumers: teenagers and children. And it has ignored the sweeping damage these Platforms have caused to the mental and physical health of our nation’s youth. In doing so, Meta engaged in, and continues to engage in, deceptive and unlawful conduct in violation of state and federal law." 

The lawsuit, which involves at least 32 states so far, alleges Meta "misled its users and the public by boasting a low prevalence of harmful content," while being "keenly aware" its platforms’ features "cause young users significant physical and mental harm." The filing says that Meta’s recommendation algorithm promotes "compulsive use," which the company does not disclose. The lawsuit claims that social comparison features like "Likes" promote mental health harms for young users, while visual filters are known to promote body dysmorphia and eating disorders.

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Meta offers features "it claims promote connection between friends, but actually serve to increase young users’ time spent on the platform," the complaint says. 

The lawsuit accuses Meta of "routinely publishing misleading reports boasting a deceptively low incidence of user harms." 

"Despite overwhelming internal research, independent expert analysis, and publicly available data that its Social Media Platforms harm young users, Meta still refuses to abandon its use of known harmful features—and has instead redoubled its efforts to misrepresent, conceal, and downplay the impact of those features on young users’ mental and physical health," it alleges. 

The states signed onto the lawsuit include Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin. 

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The lawsuit accuses Meta of marketing its social media platforms to children under age 13 and having actual knowledge that users under age 13 are on their platforms without seeking parental consent prior to collecting and monetizing their personal data. Meta "refuses to limit its collection and use of those children’s personal information as required by law," the lawsuit says. 

The complaint warns that Meta is expanding its "exploitative" practices into other domains, including through "Meta’s Virtual Reality Metaverse, where young users are immersed into Meta’s new Horizon Worlds platform; Meta’s communication Platforms like WhatsApp and Messenger; and other products, in which Meta uses evolving technology to replicate the harmful strategies it honed through its experiments on the young users of Instagram and Facebook."

Reacting to the lawsuit, Meta said 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," Reuters reported. 

Hundreds of lawsuits have also been filed against Google’s YouTube and Chinese-owned ByteDance’s TikTok on behalf of children and school districts over the platforms’ addictiveness. 

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Reuters reported that at least nine other states are expected to file similar litigation against Meta on Tuesday.