Meta loses trial after arguing child exploitation was “inevitable” on its apps

Meta plans to appeal as it faces down two other child safety trials.

See full article...

 

[SixDegrees]

Torrez’s office then conducted an undercover investigation codenamed “Operation MetaPhile”

Bonus points for apropos naming.

 

[Speaking from Europe...]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

 

[oldmacneco]

Let's hope they end up paying a significant fraction of that sum.

 

[Sajuuk]

Meta has an annual revenue of $200b, with ~$9b of profit.

 

[msawzall]

Meta loses trial after arguing child exploitation was “inevitable” on its apps

What?! How do you lose a lawsuit with an iron tight argument like that? /s

 

[Runner400]

Good to see Meta lose here, but $375M is a drop in the bucket for zuck, and is only 17% of what the state wanted. It's truly pathetic we can't hold corporations accountable, yet people were spending 20+ years in prison for half a gram of cannabis.

 

[Zitchas]

What?! How do you lose a lawsuit with an iron tight argument like that? /s

I don't know, but it seems right up there with the "The position was illegal and granted illegal powers, so it should be outside the Court's ability to review." argument from the DODGE court case. Seems like non-sensical defense arguments keep cropping up.

 

[cyberpenguin]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

"And the Guardian noted that the jury did order Meta to pay the maximum penalty under state consumer protection laws."

Too low, yes. But, hopefully they will have to pay the full amount and this loss will serve to open the floodgates.

 

[SixDegrees]

“We respectfully disagree with the verdict and will appeal,” Meta’s spokesperson said.

You better have a lot more than that. Appeals have to be based on legal or procedural errors. They're not a "do over" because you didn't like the outcome. You have to show there was some error committed by the court or opposition to hope an appeal stands.

 

[JohnCarter17]

Sticking this here, since its legal.

Victory on The High Seas!

https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/5799938-supreme-court-rules-cox-communications/

The Supreme Court unanimously ruled Wednesday that Sony cannot hold Cox Communications liable for not doing enough to disconnect customers who illegally downloaded copyrighted music, a battle that has sent ripples through the music and telecommunications industries.

Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the majority, said a lower court got it wrong in putting Cox on the hook for damages merely because it refused to disconnect customers it allegedly knew were repeat infringers. Though the outcome for Cox was unanimous, two of the liberal justices didn’t sign onto Thomas’s broader reasoning.

“Under our precedents, a company is not liable as a copyright infringer for merely providing a service to the general public with knowledge that it will be used by some to infringe copyrights,” Thomas wrote.

Thomas said that music labels need to clear a higher bar. To be sued, an internet service provider must actually intend for its product to be used for infringement or tailor the product for illegal activity.

 

[KrookedRooster]

I'm most bothered by the "Let's turn off Encryption for Kids"
Who is a "Kid" then?

Should a parent be able to snoop on their kids communications up to 18?
Not all parents are paragons of virtue so the kid may want/need to have a private channel.

I mean, legally are they not a "person" until a certain age so the law does not protect them and the government can search through the Facebook Firehose for bad actors?

Disclaimer: I am not a parent.

 

[msawzall]

You better have a lot more than that. Appeals have to be based on legal or procedural errors. They're not a "do over" because you didn't like the outcome. You have to show there was some error committed by the court or opposition to hope an appeal stands.

This gives me a goofy idea for sports... If a ref blows a call and it costs you the game, you should be able to request the game be played again. A season could last a decade.

 

[infernal666]

If they knew the exploitation was inevitable and still built the platform and the tools for the criminals to use then why are they not on the hook for willfull ignorance/conspiracy charges?

I mean at least a minimum attractive nuisance charge like people who have pools and no fence or pool cover.

 

[jdale]

Rather than make it easy to trace harms on its platforms, the jury learned from frustrated cops that Meta “generated high volumes of ‘junk’ reports by overly relying on AI to moderate its platforms.” This made its reporting “useless” and “meant crimes could not be investigated,” The Guardian reported.

I just want to call out this part. This is one of the things that AI is supposed to help with, since moderation is in fact very hard and can even be harmful to the moderators themselves.

But even here, AI is doing more harm than good.

 

[WereCatf]

I am really fucking appalled how little kids' health and safety really matter, both in and out of court; executives choose to just let abuse and trafficking happen because they make more money that way, courts just impose fines that are so small as not even make teeny, tiny dent in the companies' books and no one ever goes to prison even for a single fucking day!

What kind of a fucked up world is this where money trumps everything?!

 

[SnakeJG]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

Hopefully it is the first of many. Two more trials are happening now if each of them results in multiple hundreds of millions in fines, those drops will start adding up fast.

Also, it doesn't need to be big enough to really hurt the business, just big enough to make it cheaper for them to actually protect kids on the platform instead of just ignoring the problem.

 

[jdale]

If they knew the exploitation was inevitable and still built the platform and the tools for the criminals to use then why are they not on the hook for willfull ignorance/conspiracy charges?

I mean at least a minimum attractive nuisance charge like people who have pools and no fence or pool cover.

The trial isn't over. This was the jury phase but there are other aspects that will be decided by a judge and not a jury. I don't know what parts that will be though.

 

[Lexus Lunar Lorry]

Sticking this here, since its legal.

Victory on The High Seas!

https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/5799938-supreme-court-rules-cox-communications/

I'm surprised to see Clarence Thomas on the right side of history for once. Is he having a lucid moment, is he trying to protect AI pirates startups, or is he protecting his own personal torrenting?

 

[egbert65]

Good. Now break the damned company up and make them responsible for content on their platforms. Twenty years ago I'd have argued that they couldn't possibly be responsible - but right now it seems the only way to make sure the greedy, amoral SoBs actually give a shit.

 

[SirOmega]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

My question is the jurisdiction of the case - if that settlement just covers New Mexico, then ideally the other 49 states could essentially mount the same cases, same experts, etc. and face 49 other 375M judgements. Which maybe adds up to something significant for their bottom line.

 

[King_V]

Meta loses trial after arguing child exploitation was “inevitable” on its apps

This is just begging for:

 

[Tactical Finesse]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

Unfortunately larger more appropriate judgements inevitably get tossed and whittled down even lower.

 

[msawzall]

I'm most bothered by the "Let's turn off Encryption for Kids"
Who is a "Kid" then?

Should a parent be able to snoop on their kids communications up to 18?
Not all parents are paragons of virtue so the kid may want/need to have a private channel.

I mean, legally are they not a "person" until a certain age so the law does not protect them and the government can search through the Facebook Firehose for bad actors?

Disclaimer: I am not a parent.

The definition of "child" is usually up to the state's discretion. For example, in child support cases, the age of emancipation is 21 in NY but in most states it's 18. Or do we go by voting age, age of consent, age to enlist in the military, or some other metric? It's very vague.

tl;dr: It's basically up to the state to decide.

 

[SomewhereAroundBarstow]

So the argument was that choice A inevitably led to outcome B but that's excusable because it's just a side effect of outcome $?

I'm surprised Meta can't afford better lawyers.

 

[Tactical Finesse]

Sticking this here, since its legal.

Victory on The High Seas!

https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/5799938-supreme-court-rules-cox-communications/

Being happy for Cox winning feels a bit like rooting for the Extra Spicy Rats of the mid-1300s.

But, I'll take it.

 

[fellow human]

Good to see Meta lose here, but $375M is a drop in the bucket for zuck, and is only 17% of what the state wanted. It's truly pathetic we can't hold corporations accountable, yet people were spending 20+ years in prison for half a gram of cannabis.

Agree but hopefully this is just the beginning. With this precedent the other pending suits should hopefully have an easier time winning. Death by a thousand papercuts perhaps.

 

[SomewhereAroundBarstow]

Good. Now break the damned company up and make them responsible for content on their platforms. Twenty years ago I'd have argued that they couldn't possibly be responsible - but right now it seems the only way to make sure the greedy, amoral SoBs actually give a shit.

It's amazing to wake up in the morning and reflect on how much my thinking has changed about people, platforms, publishing, and the public square. The internet has become a giant game of denying responsibility by appealing to outdated models of media and speech. It's long past time for a rethink.

 

[cosmotose]

My question is the jurisdiction of the case - if that settlement just covers New Mexico, then ideally the other 49 states could essentially mount the same cases, same experts, etc. and face 49 other 375M judgements. Which maybe adds up to something significant for their bottom line.

I LOVE the way you think.

 

[Sajuuk]

I am really fucking appalled how little kids' health and safety really matter, both in and out of court; executives choose to just let abuse and trafficking happen because they make more money that way, courts just impose fines that are so small as not even make teeny, tiny dent in the companies' books and no one ever goes to prison even for a single fucking day!

What kind of a fucked up world is this where money trumps everything?!

The one we’ve all built and reproduce together, because the opportunity for personal comfort is limitless.

 

[Megahedron]

I'm happy about this ruling, but at the same time, I'm very worried about this paragraph in particular.

If Torrez gets his way, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp will be effectively age-gated, and child predators will be detected and removed more often in the future. To accomplish that, he thinks kids should also be cut off from sending encrypted messages, which he argued bad actors rely on to evade arrest. The court may agree, as it was revealed during the trial that Meta chose to set chats as encrypted by default despite warnings that the setting would make it harder to investigate child predators on its platforms.

How exactly is this age gate going to be implemented? I think we all know the answer, it's going to be more "upload your ID to post" bullshit, with a side of "disabling encryption so the gubmint can snoop through your conversations for the children!"

I just want an unqualified victory for once, y'know? All I want is to be left alone in my own little corner of the Internet where I can be a freak and post subversive thoughts like "I want to date a werewolf" or "I think people should have a stable place to live, food in their pantry, and enough time and money to explore their hobbies" without looking over my shoulder. Is that really too much to ask?

 

[Oldmanalex]

This gives me a goofy idea for sports... If a ref blows a call and it costs you the game, you should be able to request the game be played again. A season could last a decade.

And if it were baseball, that decade would seem like a lifetime.

 

[Hmnhntr]

Th fine was too low , a rounding error for these bastards

Yeah, that was disappointing, but hopefully there will be some more meat in the second phase of the trial. Even an upfront warning that these apps cause documented harm to children and expose them to sexual abuse by child predators might reduce the number of parents that let their kids use it. But hopefully we would see something closer to an outright ban.

 

[BigEddieD]

Being happy for Cox winning feels a bit like rooting for the Extra Spicy Rats of the mid-1300s.

But, I'll take it.

I don't think the rats were actually spicy, it was just the seasoning.

That the seasoning in this case happened to be fleas, and not salt or pepper or cumin or what have you is absolutely irrelevant.

 

[terkans]

I'm most bothered by the "Let's turn off Encryption for Kids"
Who is a "Kid" then?

Should a parent be able to snoop on their kids communications up to 18?
Not all parents are paragons of virtue so the kid may want/need to have a private channel.

I mean, legally are they not a "person" until a certain age so the law does not protect them and the government can search through the Facebook Firehose for bad actors?

Disclaimer: I am not a parent.

I've been thinking that it's a mistake to offer encrypted chats inside public discussions apps like Facebook and Instagram. It blurs the lines between what happens in public and what happens in private.

In real life there is a vast difference between meeting someone on a public terrace and going to their appartment. If we had a similar separation/barrier between public chats and private ones, that might help some kids (and other vulnerable people) avoid being digitally dragged into unhealthy situations.

Chat apps like WhatsApp and Signal should remain proprely encrypted, and we should promote awareness that going there is like stepping into someones private residence and there is no public watchdog to keep anyone safe.

 

[kinisonkhan]

If your user base is so large that child exploration is inevitable, then you need to stop allowing children on your site. You cant justify "well its only 2% of children being kidnapped or lured into trafficking", you gotta work that down to 0% and if you cant, then you cant allow children at all.

 

[Oldmanalex]

I am really fucking appalled how little kids' health and safety really matter, both in and out of court; executives choose to just let abuse and trafficking happen because they make more money that way, courts just impose fines that are so small as not even make teeny, tiny dent in the companies' books and no one ever goes to prison even for a single fucking day!

What kind of a fucked up world is this where money trumps everything?!

And we wonder why half the kids we know are in therapy.

 

[Hmnhntr]

I'm happy about this ruling, but at the same time, I'm very worried about this paragraph in particular.


How exactly is this age gate going to be implemented? I think we all know the answer, it's going to be more "upload your ID to post" bullshit, with a side of "disabling encryption so the gubmint can snoop through your conversations for the children!"

I just want an unqualified victory for once, y'know? All I want is to be left alone in my own little corner of the Internet where I can be a freak and post subversive thoughts like "I want to date a werewolf" or "I think people should have a stable place to live, food in their pantry, and enough time and money to explore their hobbies" without looking over my shoulder. Is that really too much to ask?

I agree, but I'm at a loss with how to square "no children allowed" and "doesn't use private information". I've heard that potentially there could be solutions that involve a state digital ID of some kind? But that still relies on neither the government nor Meta deciding to hang onto that data. I would love for any kind of system like that to have to have regular (at least annual) confirmation that data is not being stored, and that any transmission of personal information is properly encrypted. But I have no idea how practical any of that would be.

 

[Hmnhntr]

If your user base is so large that child exploration is inevitable, then you need to stop allowing children on your site. You cant justify "well its only 2% of children being kidnapped or lured into trafficking", you gotta work that down to 0% and if you cant, then you cant allow children at all.

To be a bit grim, surely physical places like Disneyland/world have a kidnapping rate?

 

[jimmy.j.r]

I'm most bothered by the "Let's turn off Encryption for Kids"
Who is a "Kid" then?

Should a parent be able to snoop on their kids communications up to 18?
Not all parents are paragons of virtue so the kid may want/need to have a private channel.

I mean, legally are they not a "person" until a certain age so the law does not protect them and the government can search through the Facebook Firehose for bad actors?

Disclaimer: I am not a parent.

this is one of the exceedingly few things that I don't want Meta to do. switching off encrypted chat for a specific subset of people feels like it'll give folks like the feds a foot in the door.