Under 13s on social media, late checks. Zuckerberg admits

The CEO of Meta, Mark Zuckerberghe publicly admitted that Instagram took too long to effectively locate the users under 13 years oldsupposedly banned on the platform, during his testimony before a Los Angeles civil court.

Zuckerberg testifies in the trial he sees Meta and Google accused of knowingly designing Instagram and YouTube to make them “addictive” per i young usersaccusations which both deny. Instagram only started asking those who opened an account for their date of birth in 2019, later extending the obligation to all users in 2021.

New tools added

“We’ve added new (detection) tools over the years,” the Facebook co-founder said, “but I think we could have gotten there sooner.” In the courtroom, the plaintiff’s lawyer, Mark Lanier, cited an internal document from 2018 which estimated – already in 2015 – approximately four million Instagram accounts attributable to children under 13 years of age. At the time, by the same estimate, 30% of 10-12 year olds in the United States were using social media. Today, the company recalled, the platform is used age identification tools also based on content and interactions.

Twelve jurors will have to decide by the end of March whether YouTube (Google) e Instagram (Meta) are partly responsible for mental health problems reported by Kaley G.M.a 20-year-old Californian who began using social media intensively as a child. Lanier pointed out that the young woman signed up for Instagram in 2015, when she was 9 years old, at a time when there were no age controls. It is the first time that Zuckerberg, head of the group that controls Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, testifies under oath before a jury on the topic of application security used by billions of people. The case is part of a group of proceedings “the ball“, together with two others expected in Los Angeles by the summer, chosen to test the strategies with which to deal with thousands of complaints that attribute to social a role in the increase of depression, anxiety, eating disorders and, in some cases, suicides among young people.

Zuckerberg’s goals and Meta’s defense

During the hearing, the plaintiff’s lawyer also referred to internal documents according to which in 2015 Zuckerberg set the goal of a 12% increase in average time spent on Instagram. “We had goals,” Zuckerberg acknowledged, explaining however that at a certain point he decided to eliminate them and shift focus to the “usefulness and value” of the platform. When subjected to repeated questions on the topic, he at times showed irritation. “If you create something that’s not good for people, maybe they’ll spend more time on it in the short term, but they won’t be happy about it,” he said. According to Matthew Bergman, founder of the Social Media Victims Law Center,” internal documents show that Meta understood the dangers of its platforms for young people“, but “continued anyway.” Meta “strongly” disputes these accusations and claims a “long-term commitment” to regulation and parental control tools.

The legal context and ongoing proceedings

Furthermore, in the classroom we discuss the app designof the algorithms and customization functions: the US lawin fact, very broadly limits the responsibility of the platforms for content published by users. TikTok and Snapchatalso cited in the complaints, chose a confidential agreement with Kaley GM before the trial. The ongoing lawsuits in Los Angeles proceed in parallel with a national litigation before a federal judge in Oakland, California, which could lead to another trial in 2026.