California is sharpening a blade.
Legislation is on the table. Child safety failures could trigger fines so steep they make tech executives sweat cold.
Meta?
They want out.
Insiders say Meta is running a lobbying sprint to dodge millions in potential fees before a Tuesday hearing even happens. They’ve brought lawmakers gifts. Amendments.
Exceptions.
Carve-outs.
The safety theater trade
The deal they’re offering is familiar.
If companies just slap some default safety settings on the platform, they won’t pay the piper.
Autoplay off. DMs restricted. Explicit content scrubbed.
Meta is pushing this hard.
Here is the catch.
Most platforms already did this.
Under minor accounts anyway.
Advocates say these features don’t do enough.
They don’t.
The kids find the cracks. They slip through.
Meta isn’t stopping at software toggles though. They’re also selling the idea that parental controls should save them. Let parents watch the screen time. Let them monitor every click.
Experts laugh at this.
They argue parental controls are equally useless. Parents aren’t there twenty-four seven. They get distracted. Life happens.
But Meta is banking on it.
The million-dollar kid
Why the rush?
Bill AB 2 doesn’t mince words.
Without Meta’s suggested tweaks the bill stands firm.
Fine it up to $1 million per child.
Per. Child.
If the design is negligent.
Let’s pause for a second.
Can you even wrap your head around the liability exposure there?
Ignoring the past
History is not kind to them right now.
Back in March Meta lost a big court case.
Ruled against them alongside Google.
The verdict: platform design hurt young mental health and Meta refused to fix it.
New Mexico jurors weren’t feeling charitable either.
Ordered them to pay $375M.
Why? For advertising their app as “safe for kids” when it wasn’t. Deception.
Meta says they changed.
They revamped things. Automatic age detection now scans you in.
Global Teen Accounts exist with tighter reins.
But in court? They deny the core problem.
They claim teen mental health is “profoundly complex.” Too complex to blame on an app.
“Defend vigorously” they said.
Confident in their record they claimed.
They want a pass now though.
Just change the bill slightly and let us off the hook.
Will the lawmakers take the bait?
California is watching.
The money is real.
