"Meta will complain for as long as it can"

Düsseldorf. Few people know Meta as well and criticise the company as harshly as Frances Haugen. The computer scientist worked for many years at Google, Yelp, Pinterest and Facebook. She became famous in 2021 when she leaked internal documents to the Wall Street Journal as a whistleblower. The business journal published nine articles on the "Facebook Files", which dealt with the problems of children on social media, among other things.

The articles caused quite a stir, Haugen testified before the US Congress, and various lawsuits were filed against Facebook's parent company Meta, which are still pending.

Haugen now lives in Puerto Rico and works for the American think tank Centre for Media, Technology and Democracy, among others. The American spoke to Handelsblatt about the judgements that federal courts in New Mexico and California have now issued against Meta and other social media.

Read the full interview with Frances Haugen here

How important do you think the new judgements in the USA, in which social media companies were convicted for their treatment of young users, are?
They are extremely important. You can compare this with the lawsuits against asbestos, opiates or Monsanto and Roundup. If you take the fines per injured individual, which amount to several million dollars, then it can add up to a trillion dollars.

How exactly did you come up with that?
There are 40 to 44 million teenagers in the USA. If you extend the age group to include eight to 22-year-olds, there are more than 60 million people. If, statistically speaking, only a fraction of one per cent of them are affected, then this is the total.

In view of this threat, Meta or other companies should be trembling at the knees and have to change their behaviour.
Meta will continue to sue for as long as it can. Every week means four billion dollars in profits for them - in total, Meta makes 200 billion dollars a year. So until a judge forces them to change, they won't settle - even if it costs them millions of dollars in lawyers and other legal fees. They don't care.

What do you think would be an effective remedy?
I find it fascinating to look at exactly when Meta changed its regulations with children in mind. For example, when Australia hinted at banning social media for children two years ago, Meta announced a large number of product improvements such as private accounts or controls for parents in autumn 2024. This is very unusual in the tech industry to rush ahead like this because it puts the company under legal liability. If you don't deliver the product on time, you can have the SEC on your back. But they were so nervous about Australia that they did it anyway.