2y ago

At Meta, Millions of Underage Users Were an ‘Open Secret,’ States Say

www.nytimes.com /2023/11/25/technology/instagram-meta-children-privacy.html

Meta has received more than 1.1 million reports of users under the age of 13 on its Instagram platform since early 2019 yet it “disabled only a fraction” of those accounts, according to a newly unsealed legal complaint against the company brought by the attorneys general of 33 states.

Instead, the social media giant “routinely continued to collect” children’s personal information, like their locations and email addresses, without parental permission, in violation of a federal children’s privacy law, according to the court filing. Meta could face hundreds of millions of dollars, or more, in civil penalties should the states prove the allegations.

35 comments

I mean no shit? Everyone knows kids will lie about their age to sign up for something. 99% of kids born after the internet got popular have lied about their age. Everyone knows they do it.
- The point is they knew about it and didn’t remove them from the platform while saying the opposite.
  
  How did they know about it?
- As someone who lied as a child to get in free (kids under 5 free) and who had a beard in high school so he could buy beer. All before the Internet.
  This isn't a "new quirky Internet Age". People have been lying about their age since time immemorial.
I was surprised this was about Instagram and not their VR platform where children are regularly experiencing wildly inappropriate situations and straight up pedophiles.
- I don't know about Instagram, but you can get on their VR platform officially at age 13 (when you can also get a Facebook account) and you can easily get a parent to hook it up to their Facebook account instead.
  13 is way too young for Facebook. Sure, savvy kids will still find a way to get on, but we are not doing enough to protect kids. And I don't mean in a bullshit, dangerous KOSA way.
Aw, geez! How did all these minors get onto our platform? After we have done literally nothing to prevent it or make any impediment whatsoever? How could we have possibly known unless we used the detailed granular data that we collect on all of our users from sneaker preference to private health data, which we literally use every second of every day?
could face hundreds of millions of dollars, or more, in civil penalties
...while making billions in profit and grooming a generation of users to clear trillions in profits over the next few years. Seems like the calculated cost of doing business.
Of course we aren't marketing cigarettes to kids.
- I might believe you a little if you weren't dressed as a cartoon camel as you said that.
  
  I was in an antique store with my daughter and we saw a cigarette tin with Joe Camel on it and she didn't believe me when I said it was a way they marketed cigarettes to kids. She didn't even understand why Joe Camel appealed to kids. I guess it's a different age.
So much of an open secret that this isn't even news
Wow. Shocking that a company that’s free to use and thus traffics in user data, selling it to advertisers and who knows who else would want to get data of the most vulnerable, least savvy people they can find.
Oh, let’s not forget that whatever price they’re charging for legitimate advertisers is the same any well-funded paedophiles can pay. Facebook ads aren’t terribly expensive.
Yeah, this is my shocked face.
Of course.
My kids use the Quest headset. I made them their own accounts, underage, because I didn’t want their games and Headset on my account. Their friends are mostly the same with their own FB/meta accounts.
It’s stupid because they force you to have a Facebook account to use the headset. TF did they think was gonna happen. And that’s just headset gamers, not kids that want to use instagram, messenger, or FB itself.
- This may have changed recently, but I just bought the Quest 3 and wasn’t forced to create a Facebook account. I did have to create a Meta account, though. As far as I can tell, it’s fairly separate from Facebook and Instagram and I have no intentions of linking it to either of those types of accounts.
  
  That’s good to know. I know they did switch from FB to Meta, but nonetheless I think the age limit is 13(?) to have your own account, and ours were 10 and 8 when I set them up. Still underage.
Click "OK" to certify you are over 13 and you have parental consent before we allow you to use our services
How did they think this would turn out?
No one has to work at Faceboot. It isn't like Walmart or something. People getting jobs there are very qualified. I think this needs to get mentioned more. People with a choose are choosing to work for a shit evil company.
Eh, I immediately stop caring when the reporter says "only a fraction." What the fuck is that? 99/100 is "only a fraction."
- And? Your interpretation of the phrase isn’t common, and no one cares that you don’t care.
  Edit: also, it’s not the reporter’s phrasing, they’re quoting the legal complaint by 33 states, hence the quotation marks.
  Here, for your reading pleasure
  https://coag.gov/app/uploads/2023/10/23.10.24-Doc.-1-Complaint-People-v.-Meta-23cv05448.pdf
  
  Why the hostility? My point is that 'just a fraction' is a useless metric and we should focus on specifics.
  They should be sharing what number of the accounts are banned so we have a clearer picture of the issue.
"hundreds of millions of dollars"--sigh, how much? We'll write you a check.
90% of you here are under 18. Don't act like you care just because it's Facebook.
- I'd like to see a source for that. Of all the places on the internet, lemmy is one of the last ones I'll believe is full of kids.
  
  Source: his 🍑
- On the lemmy/kbin? I'd say 90% are above 30.

35 comments