Opening arguments began Tuesday in a federal trial that could reshape how Meta Platforms operates Facebook and Instagram and cost the company significant financial damages. The trial is taking place in Oakland, California, before U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.
Attorneys general from California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey are leading this first wave of litigation. Twenty-nine states sued Meta in 2023 over child safety and privacy concerns. The remaining 25 will go to trial at a later date. The company also faces separate lawsuits in state courts.
The lawsuit accuses Meta of knowingly designing features that addict children to its platforms and of routinely collecting data on children under 13 without parental consent, in violation of federal law. Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman framed the case in stark terms. "This week, we're in court with the largest consumer protection lawsuit in American history. We'll show a jury that Meta concealed what it knew about the harm its products cause young people because looking away was more profitable," he said in a written statement.
Meta pushed back. "We are proud of our record in protecting teens on our platforms and the amount of effort that we've put into developing protections over the years, even before these cases were ever filed, and continuing to the present day. We look forward to showing the judge and the jury those facts in court," the company said in a written statement.
The proceedings are expected to last six to eight weeks. Testimony is expected from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other current and former company executives. Judge Gonzalez Rogers was appointed to the bench by President Barack Obama in 2011 and has experience with high-profile Big Tech cases, including Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI and Epic Games' lawsuit against Apple over its app store.
The trial is part of a broader wave of litigation against social media companies. Meta, Google's YouTube, TikTok and Snap all face lawsuits arguing their platforms harm young users, illegally collect data on minors and are built to keep children engaged at the expense of their wellbeing.
