The terrifying truth about child safety on Facebook and Instagram

In a series of historic legal blows to Silicon Valley, two juries have delivered the first verdicts holding Meta - the parent company of Facebook and Instagram - directly responsible for the health and safety risks facing young users.

The successful prosecutions were bolstered by testimony from former high-ranking Meta executives who bravely gave evidence against the platforms they helped build.

Brian Boland, who spent 11 years as a vice president at the company, said the verdicts were "a watershed moment".

"Bad product design - building something that you understand is harming people - is indefensible," Boland told 60 Minutes.

"I think this is a huge moment that's going to change the legal landscape and it's going to hold companies way more accountable than they ever have been before."

Boland oversaw the advertising machine that generates billions for the company. He described a system deliberately designed to hook users, with devastating consequences.

"Everything from depression, to eating disorders, to suicide, to everything in between," he said. 

"The platform was spreading information that could make you feel hateful towards another person, drive divisions along race, immigrant status, and religion, and that was the point where I was convinced we were on the wrong side of history."

Boland's claims were backed up in court by Arturo Bejar, a former Meta engineer and executive in charge of user protection.

Bejar watched his 14-year-old daughter become the target of "unwanted sexual advances and unsolicited nudes" on Instagram. 

"I found a company that had begun to systematically look away from the harm that young people were experiencing," Bejar said.

"One of the things that most parents don't understand about Instagram is that when your kid is in their bedroom and you think they're safe, Instagram is inviting strangers into their room, connecting them, enabling communication."

Bejar revealed in court he had taken alarming statistics directly to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in 2021. 

The data showed 50 per cent of Instagram users reported a "bad experience" within a seven-day period, only two out of every 10,000 of those users received help through Meta's tools. 

One in eight children aged between 13 and 15 received unwanted sexual advances in a single week - 98 per cent of the time from strangers.

Bejar said Zuckerberg never replied to the data. 

"You cannot trust them," Bejar warned.

"They will tell you their product is safe when you can easily demonstrate it isn't. The safety tools do not work, most of them, and there's a staggering amount of harm."

Boland reported a similar experience after emailing Zuckerberg about the risks facing users. 

"He doesn't want to be confronted with the growing evidence before him," Boland said.

"I think the question is, like, does he have a soul? Does he have a moral compass that guides him or does he have an intellectual compass that is focused on the pursuit of power and on winning?"

On top of the damning testimony from Boland and Bejar, the New Mexico case was built on the back of Operation Metaphile, an undercover sting that exposed how Meta's platforms connect criminals with children.

The investigation saw three men arrested at a motel, where they believed they were meeting a 12-year-old girl for sex, after meeting her on Facebook. 

The men had no idea they were instead talking to undercover operatives.

"Two of the three individuals who showed up and were taken into custody had previously been flagged by Meta itself for inappropriate contact on their platforms, and yet they were still allowed to create new accounts and to continue with this kind of behaviour," New Mexico Attorney-General Raul Torrez said.

"Had we not shown up and put them in handcuffs, what would have happened without us?"

Torrez compared the digital space to a physical warehouse where child exploitation is traded in plain sight.

"Meta's platforms are the largest online marketplace for predatory behaviour on the planet," he said.

The New Mexico trial was recorded by the Courtroom View Network.

During a deposition, Mark Zuckerberg couldn't deny child grooming content was found on his platforms. But he refused to admit Meta's products were "addictive" to users. 

"I think people sometimes use that word colloquially," Zuckerberg said.

"That's not what we're trying to do with the products and it's not how I think they work."

Bejar dismissed the company's defence as "professional gaslighting".

In March, both juries agreed.

In New Mexico, Meta was fined US$375 million ($520.6 million) for misleading the public about the safety of its products and prioritising growth over the wellbeing of children.

The next day, the Los Angeles jury found Meta responsible for the depression and anxiety of a young woman addicted to social media, awarding her $US6 million ($8.3 million) in damages.

As the legal landscape shifts, Torrez hopes the financial and moral pressure will force the company to better protect users. 

"This is a crack in the dam," he said.

"It signals to tech leaders that the era of acting with impunity is over."

Watch the full episode of 60 Minutes on 9Now.