In October ۲۰۲۱, Abrham Meareg’s father, a professor of chemistry in Ethiopia’s northern town of Bahir Dar, was shot at close range and died outside his family home. This was in the middle of the country’s civil war.
For weeks, Facebook’s algorithm had actively promoted posts calling for the academic to be murdered, according to Meareg and Foxglove, a nonprofit organisation supporting Meareg’s lawsuit against the company in Kenya. These posts included photos of his father and his home address.
Meareg filed the lawsuit in ۲۰۲۲. He said he repeatedly asked Facebook to remove the posts and the company did nothing. Nearly four years later, the case has still not been heard. Foxglove said Meta, Facebook’s parent company, had “fought tooth and nail to avoid responsibility”.
Meareg said: “It’s a matter of numbers to them, a matter of statistics. It has been proven multiple times that our lives do not matter to them.”
On Wednesday, Meta settled a lawsuit brought by ۲۹ US states who argued it had designed addictive products that hooked young people. The social media company agreed to pay $۱۸bn and to change certain features of its platform in the US. California’s attorney general said it was a victory that would make “a world of difference for children and their families”.
But elsewhere in the world, in jurisdictions as far flung as Amsterdam and Nairobi, other claims have yet to be heard. Far bigger questions about the power of a single US technology company to shape politics and democracy everywhere on Earth are still to be answered.
For the US, the settlement is a victory. A jury has done what the US Congress could not – put controls on a powerful tech company. As a part of the settlement, Meta has said it will set time limits on children’s use of its platforms Facebook and Instagram and block night-time usage.
For Meta, the settlement is also a victory. Its share price rose in the hours after the deal was announced. Its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, was not forced to testify. The sum it is to pay, while not meaningless, is far less than the states had sought – $۲۰۰bn – or the amount Meta itself had suggested in a court filing it might have to pay, which was up to $۱.۴tn.
For the rest of the world, however, the picture is more mixed. The limits Meta will put on its US platform are, in large part, similar to limits the UK and Australia have already achieved through regulation. There are certain concessions Meta has now made that other governments could also demand: for example, while the UK plans to ban under-۱۶s from social media platforms, it may wish to ask Meta to impose a default daily use limit of two hours for under-۱۸s, which is what the company has agreed to in the US.
None of this meaningfully changes the equation for Meareg or what his case represents, which is that a massive US company, unaccountable to voters, unbound by transparency requirements, owns a worldwide digital commons that shapes reality for billions of people.
Whether courts and governments outside the US have the power to confront this fact is a far thornier question.
The central issue of Meareg’s case is Meta’s algorithm. This is the system that decides what content to show users of Facebook and Instagram. It sees you linger over a video about knitting sweaters, for example, and then decides you’ll like one about how to care for your spider plant.
It sees teenage girls watch diet content and shows them anorexia influencers. It sees young men search for bodybuilding content and shows them Andrew Tate. It is alleged to have amplified content that promoted the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya in Myanmar. It contributed to the election victory of Donald Trump.
Meareg’s lawsuit rests on the claim that this algorithm promoted the posts that called for the death of his father, and that Facebook’s sparse moderation in east Africa did almost nothing to prevent this.
In the early days of the Meta trial in the US, it seemed plausible that states would push the social media firm to finally make some changes to this algorithm. Those changes had the potential to fundamentally alter how the company does business. Meta’s algorithm is intended to keep users scrolling, stuck on the platform, and then it shows them ads.
But that is not what appears to have happened. The terms of the settlement will slightly change what is shown to minors, in that they will not necessarily have personalised feeds. But it is hard to see this concession changing the equation in war zones or creaking democracies.
Arturo Béjar, an ex-Facebook employee and whistleblower, said the limitations were “the equivalent of saying: ‘Well, you can smoke as many cigarettes as you can in two hours a day.’ It doesn’t make the cigarettes any safer.”
It may be up to groups and individuals elsewhere in the world to try to push for these larger changes. It will be an uphill struggle.
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In Kenya, the high court recently ruled that Meareg’s case against Meta could go ahead, after years of legal manoeuvring from the company to try to prevent it. It could now be heard in the next year.
Rosa Curling, Foxglove’s co-executive director, said: “Meta’s lawyers have spent years trying to prevent this important case being heard, thankfully without success. We hope that the news from the US is a sign that Mark Zuckerberg’s time is finally up.”
In the Netherlands, Repro Uncensored, a nonprofit organisation tracking digital censorship, hailed the US settlement as a “major victory”. Repro Uncensored has an ongoing legal case against Meta in the Netherlands for alleged discrimination against queer accounts, and plans further action in other European countries.
Martha Dimitratou, Repro Uncensored’s executive director, said: “The next stage of accountability must address not only addictive design but algorithms, discriminatory moderation and automated decision-making. These systems shape civic participation and democracy, and the companies controlling them must be held accountable globally.”
The European Commission released a charge sheet against Meta this summer saying the company’s features, including its infinite scroll, contributed to “unhealthy habits and compulsive use”.
That charge sheet is part of an investigation into Meta that the commission launched in ۲۰۲۴. It may lead to Europe pushing for larger changes from Meta, including to its personal algorithm.
It is unclear whether any of these groups or parties can succeed. Meta appears to fear US regulators and courts: after all, it caved after just four days of its US trial. It does not appear to be as intimidated by regulators elsewhere.
Earlier this year it managed to dodge a class-action lawsuit brought by a group of Rohingya refugees over its alleged role in contributing to a genocide in Myanmar. It will have the help of the Trump administration in opposing any EU regulation that could curb its reach in Europe.
Meta declined to respond to questions about either Meareg’s or Repro Uncensored’s cases. In an earlier response to whistleblower allegations that it fuelled violence in Ethiopia and Myanmar, it pushed back forcefully, saying it was “just not true” that the company put profits over safety. Regarding Meareg’s case, it has said it employs staff with local knowledge and expertise to “catch violating content” in Ethiopia.
Meareg said he believed that Meta expected him to give up. “They don’t know how I am determined for justice,” he said. “It is the thing you do for the person you love. If you love someone – and I loved my dad from my heart – then he needs justice. He needs a public apology. There has to be accountability.”
