The company had a policy allowing 16 violations, such as adults soliciting minors, before it suspended accounts<\/p>\n
Facebook\u2019s parent company, Meta, failed to promptly act on accounts engaged in sex trafficking by allowing illicit content to remain on its platforms despite repeated violations, recently unsealed court filings show.
\nThe accusation is part of a lawsuit filed in California by more than 1,800 plaintiffs \u2013 including school districts, children and parents, and state attorneys general \u2013 alleging that social media giants \u201crelentlessly pursued a strategy of growth at all costs, recklessly ignoring the impact of their products on children\u2019s mental and physical health.\u201d Alongside Meta \u2013 which owns Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Threads \u2013 the suit targets Google\u2019s YouTube, ByteDance\u2019s TikTok, and Snap\u2019s Snapchat.
\nFormer Instagram safety chief Vaishnavi Jayakumar testified she was shocked to learn that Meta maintained a \u201c17-strike\u201d policy for accounts allegedly involved in human sex trafficking.
\n\u201cYou could incur 16 violations for prostitution and sexual solicitation, and upon the 17th violation, your account would be suspended,\u201d she said, calling the threshold \u201cvery, very high\u201d by industry standards.
\nThe brief alleges Meta was aware of serious harms on its platforms, including millions of adult strangers contacting minors, products that worsened teen mental-health issues, and frequent detection \u2013 but rare removal \u2013 of content related to suicide, eating disorders and child sexual abuse.<\/p>\n
Read more<\/p>\n
Meta ordered to pay $550 million to Spanish media outlets<\/p>\n
Responding to the allegations, Meta told USA Today it now enforces a \u201cone strike\u201d policy and immediately removes accounts involved in human exploitation, saying its former 17-strike system has been replaced.
\nThe company has come under mounting scrutiny in the US. Earlier this year, reports that Meta\u2019s AI chatbots could engage minors in sensual exchanges led to new safeguards for teen accounts, giving parents the option to block interactions with the bots.
\nMeta is also confronting expanding legal and regulatory challenges globally. Russia designated the firm an \u201cextremist organization\u201d in 2022 for refusing to remove prohibited content. The tech giant is facing multiple actions in the EU, including a \u20ac797 million antitrust fine tied to Facebook Marketplace, as well as separate copyright, data-protection and targeted advertising cases in Spain, France, Germany, and Norway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The company had a policy allowing 16 violations, such as adults soliciting minors, before it suspended accounts Facebook\u2019s parent company, Meta, failed to promptly act on accounts engaged in sex…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t