Another trial involving Meta has just begun, with several states claiming the company purposefully manipulated children into endlessly scrolling, citing the fact that most tech execs keep their own children away from screens.
“California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey claim Meta violated the privacy of children and has developed and deployed ‘psychologically manipulative’ features on its platforms designed to keep children scrolling,” PBS reported.
The suit accuses Meta of promoting features on their apps that promoted “compulsive and extensive” use, as well as publishing “profoundly misleading reports” about the harmful effects their tech can have on young people.
As this trial progresses, many are pointing to the fact that leaders in the tech industry must be aware of the dangers of their sites and apps because they don’t allow their own children to use them.
“I don’t generally want my kids to be sitting in front of a TV or a computer for a long period of time,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said.
Related: Are Screens Wrecking Your Child’s Life?
Meanwhile, tech industry leader Peter Thiel said he lets his children have “an hour and a half” of screen time — per week.
Mara Fath, an artist and bookseller who lives alongside programmers and other tech industry workers in San Francisco, shared similar stories with The New York Times.
“All our neighbors worked for those firms — Facebook, Google and Apple. None of them would let their children interact with any screens,” she revealed. “They all knew how addicting they were and how to protect their own children.”
This case could be big in terms of how we view the harmful effects of social media. If these states win, Meta will be forced to pay $1.4 trillion in damages — which is “just about how much Meta is worth, with a market cap of $1.4 trillion,” per PBS.
“When the state AGs are making a damage claim, they’re now not just about the money, they’re about shaping the community for the constituents they serve,” Eric Goldman, law professor at Santa Clara University School of Law, said. “Their messages are qualitatively different than a damages demand from an individual victim.”
This latest trial will seek to prove what so many leaders in the tech space already seem to know: too much screen time is bad for children.
Read Next: Meta Heads to Trial Over Claims It Deliberately Hooked Kids
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