Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg arrives outside court to take the stand at trial in a key test case accusing Meta and Google's YouTube of harming kids' mental health through addictive platforms, in Los Angeles, California, Wednesday. Reuters-Yonhap
LOS ANGELES — Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday said he regretted the slow progress his company made in identifying underage users on Instagram as he testified at a landmark social media addiction trial in Los Angeles.
Asked to comment on complaints from inside the company that not enough was being done to verify whether children under 13 were using the platform, the 41-year-old head of Meta, which also owns Facebook and WhatsApp, said improvements had been made.
But "I always wish that we could have gotten there sooner," he added.
Zuckerberg was the most hotly anticipated witness in the California trial, the first in a series of cases that could set legal precedent for thousands of lawsuits filed by American families against social media platforms.
The trial marked the first time the multibillionaire addressed the safety of his world-dominating platforms directly before a jury.
Zuckerberg was very reserved at first, an AFP journalist in the courtroom reported, but then he began to grow animated, showing signs of annoyance, shaking his head and waving his hands as he turned toward the jury.
The 12 jurors in Los Angeles heard the increasingly testy testimony as plaintiff lawyer Mark Lanier pressed Zuckerberg on age verification and his guiding philosophy for making decisions at the vast social media company he controls.
The trial is set to last until late March, when the jury will decide whether Google-owned YouTube and Meta's Instagram bear responsibility for the mental health problems suffered by Kaley G.M., a 20-year-old California resident who has been a heavy social media user since childhood.
Kaley G.M. started using YouTube at age six, Instagram at nine, then TikTok and Snapchat.
Source: Korea Times News
