Meta hid evidence of social media harm, US court filings

Meta is accused of shutting down internal research into the mental-health impact of Facebook and Instagram after discovering causal evidence that its platforms were harming users, according to newly unredacted filings in a class-action lawsuit brought by U.S. school districts.

The documents describe a 2020 study called Project Mercury, in which Meta researchers and Nielsen examined what happened when users deactivated Facebook and Instagram. According to the filings, people who stopped using the platforms for a week reported feeling less depressed, anxious, lonely, and prone to social comparison. Instead of releasing the results or expanding the research, Meta allegedly cancelled the project and declared internally that the negative findings had been “tainted by the existing media narrative around the company.”

Privately, however, employees reportedly told then–policy chief Nick Clegg that the results were sound. One researcher wrote, “The Nielsen study does show causal impact on social comparison, (unhappy face emoji),” while another warned that suppressing the findings would be comparable to “the tobacco industry doing research and knowing cigs were bad and then keeping that info to themselves.”

Despite having internal evidence of harms, the filing says Meta told Congress it lacked the ability to determine whether its products negatively affected teenage girls.

Meta spokesperson Andy Stone rejected the allegations, saying the study was stopped because “its methodology was flawed” and asserting that the company has spent years “listened to parents, researched issues that matter most, and made real changes to protect teens.”

The accusations appear in a late-Friday filing by Motley Rice, representing school districts suing Meta, Google, TikTok and Snapchat, alleging the companies concealed known risks from students, parents and educators. A hearing is scheduled for January 26 in federal court in Northern California.