A landmark federal trial commenced in a California federal court, where attorneys general from 29 states are seeking up to $1.4 trillion in damages and sweeping operational changes from Meta. The lawsuit, initially filed in 2023, accuses the tech giant of intentionally designing Facebook and Instagram features to addict children, fueling a youth mental health crisis while illegally harvesting data from users under 13.
Inside the Courtroom: Opening Arguments in Oakland
Opening statements kicked off in front of an eight-person jury in Oakland, setting the stage for what Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman called “the largest consumer protection lawsuit in American history” according to CBS News coverage. Representing the California Department of Justice, Deputy Attorney General Megan O’Neill outlined the states’ core allegations during her opening statement. O’Neill told jurors that Meta designed its apps to “hook the users, hold them for as long as they can, harvest their data and hide the truth from the public.”
The legal action involves an initial cohort of four states—California, Colorado, Kentucky, and New Jersey—pushing for financial penalties that could theoretically total $1.4 trillion. The remaining 25 states that joined the 2023 litigation are scheduled to take their cases to trial at a later date. Alongside federal proceedings, Meta continues to defend parallel lawsuits winding through various state courts.
The prosecution’s argument centers heavily on internal behavioral research conducted by Meta. O’Neill pointed directly to company studies examining how adolescent brains process rewards and social feedback, noting that developers understood how young users struggle with impulse control compared to adults. Referencing internal documentation, O’Neill cited a Meta study titled “‘The young ones are the best ones,'” arguing that the company viewed children as its primary product.
Disputing Addiction and Algorithmic Design
Defending the platform, Meta attorney Paul Schmidt pushed back against the core assertions of addiction and harm. Schmidt maintained that independent research does not validate claims that social media inherently damages adolescent well-being. According to Schmidt, CEO Mark Zuckerberg and the broader engineering teams focused entirely on building and improving user experiences. “They don’t believe they’re going to do well if people don’t like their service,” Schmidt stated in court.
Meta issued a formal written statement ahead of the proceedings, emphasizing its defensive posture. “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,” the company stated.
Testimony and Underage Data Collection Claims
The states called Arturo Béjar, a former Meta engineering director who worked at Facebook from 2009 to 2015 and later returned as a safety contractor between 2019 and 2021, as their first witness. Béjar testified that internal safety research was routinely sidelined rather than used to upgrade platform architecture. Citing content related to eating disorders, Béjar noted that engineers had functional solutions to shield young users from harmful exposure, but those fixes were routinely whittled down during review processes.
Beyond content moderation debates, the federal trial is examining age-verification protocols. Prosecutors argue that Meta routinely gathered data on children under 13 without parental consent, violating federal statutes. O’Neill told the jury that when Meta identified an underage user on Facebook, the platform typically disabled the Facebook account while leaving connected Instagram profiles entirely active, failing to take basic steps to block underage access.
The trial continues in California federal court as lawyers present further internal documents and expert testimonies regarding the platform’s architectural and product design choices.
