Mark Zuckerberg could be staring down a $200 billion penalty as a coalition of 29 states takes Meta to trial over allegations the tech giant deliberately addicted America’s children to its platforms.
The federal jury trial opened today in Oakland, California, with attorneys general accusing the company behind Instagram and Facebook of knowingly building products designed to harm young users. The case is expected to run six to eight weeks, with Zuckerberg himself expected to take the stand alongside Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri and former Meta whistleblower Arturo Béjar.
“Meta designed a dangerous product for young users, knew it to be dangerous, and then lied to children, families and the community about how dangerous it was,” said California Attorney General Rob Bonta.
The stakes couldn’t be higher. If Meta loses, the $200 billion in potential damages would equal the company’s entire 2025 annual revenue. But the states want more than money. They’re asking the court to force changes to how Meta designs its products for young people, a remedy that could reshape social media for an entire generation.
The 233-page complaint, originally filed in October 2023, paints a damning picture of corporate greed at the expense of children. Court documents allege Meta regularly collects data on children under 13 without parental consent, violating both federal and state law. The lawsuit claims the company “refuses to abandon its use of known harmful features” because doing so would hurt its bottom line.
Attorneys general from California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey are leading the proceedings as part of a multidistrict litigation effort.
According to the lawsuit, Meta “developed and refined a set of psychologically manipulative” features specifically intended to keep users glued to their screens. Infinite scrolling. Constant notification alerts. “Like” buttons. Image-altering filters. The states argue young people are particularly vulnerable to these tactics, and that excessive screen time is linked to higher rates of depression, anxiety, eating disorders and other mental health problems.
The trial will feature internal Meta research that the company likely never wanted the public to see. A 2019 survey of 2,500 teenagers, cited in court filings, found that “Young people are acutely aware that Instagram can be bad for their mental health, yet are compelled to spend time on the app for fear of missing out on cultural and social trends.”
Meta denies all allegations. A company spokesperson dismissed the lawsuit as a money grab, stating to Breitbart: “The State AGs may call this a landmark case, but their limited claims are unsubstantiated and their financial demands are vastly disproportionate. The AGs offer no proof anyone in their states was misled, claim benign features like having an additional Instagram account somehow harmed their residents, and attempt to penalize Meta for industry-wide challenges like age verification.”
The company says it stands by its “record of creating strong protections for teens.”
But Meta’s legal troubles are mounting. Just two weeks ago, a judge ordered the company to pay $567 million to New Mexico in a related case, bringing its total court-ordered payments to that state alone to $942 million. A separate state trial is currently under way in Tennessee.
Families, school districts and state attorneys general have filed thousands of lawsuits against Meta and other social media companies in recent years. In California, thousands of coordinated cases have been filed against Meta, YouTube, TikTok and Snap. Meta and YouTube lost the first such case to reach trial in February.
For parents who’ve watched their children disappear into their phones, this trial represents something bigger than corporate liability. It’s a reckoning for an industry that built its empire on capturing young minds
