Facebook owner exploited teenagers’ weaknesses – 11/26/2023 – Market

Meta, owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, designed products on its social media to take advantage of teenagers’ psychological vulnerabilities, according to new surveys that cite internal company documents, reported by the Wall Street Journal.

A 2020 internal company presentation, cited by the American newspaper, reveals that Meta sought to capitalize on parts of young people’s minds that make them “prone to impulses, peer pressure and potentially harmful behaviors.”

These internal documents are part of a lawsuit, filed in late October by members of a coalition of 41 states and the District of Columbia, who alleged that Meta intentionally built Facebook and Instagram with addictive features for young users.

Social media products have been described as likely to deliver the types of stimuli that trigger powerful neurotransmission in the brains of younger users.

“Teenagers are insatiable when it comes to feel-good dopamine effects,” Meta’s presentation shows. “Every time one of our teenage users encounters something unexpected, their brains deliver a hit of dopamine,” she adds.

Meta, however, says it did not design products to be addictive. “The complaint distorts our work using selective quotes and cherry-picked documents,” says company spokeswoman Stephanie Otway.

According to the lawsuit filed by American states, Meta had long known about the weaknesses in the platform’s protections against use by children under the age of 13, who are prohibited from using the company’s social networks both under US and Meta’s own laws.

The company’s algorithms show that, in the North American country alone, up to four million of the company’s users are minors. And instead of combating the use of its social networks by teenagers, the company would have created graphics “praising Instagram’s penetration in the 11 and 12 year old demographic”.

Otway, a Meta spokesperson, says Instagram works to remove underage users. But, according to her, verifying people’s ages online is a complex problem. Therefore, she says, the company supports legislation that would allow parents to control which apps users under 16 can download.

Documents accessed by the WSJ also support allegations that Meta’s president, Mark Zuckerberg, instructed his employees to prioritize increasing usage of their platforms above users’ well-being.

The problematic use of the company’s social networks was identified as a problem for teenagers, according to internal studies seen by the American newspaper. Meta, however, used notifications to increase the use of its platforms, knowing that teenagers had a “higher tolerance” for being seduced by notifications than adult users.

Zuckerberg, however, ignored internal warnings about problems with this type of product, according to the publication.