Now, Meta came in a lawsuit by the state of New Mexico for allegedly failing to protect minors from sexual exploitation on its apps, including Facebook and Instagram. The state claims Meta violated New Mexico’s Unfair Practices Act by implementing design features and algorithms that created dangerous conditions for users. Now, more than two years after the case was filed, opening arguments have begun in Santa Fe.

It’s a big week for Meta in court: A major social media trial also began in California today, the first legal trial in the country social media addiction. That case is part of a “JCCP,” or judicial council on coordinating proceedings, which consolidates several civil cases focusing on similar issues.

The plaintiffs in that case alleged that the social media companies designed their products in a careless manner and causing various harm to minors using their apps. Snap, TikTok, and Google are named defendants alongside Meta; Snap and TikTok have settled. The fact that Meta does not mean that some of the company’s top executives may be called to the witness stand in the coming weeks.

Meta executives, including Mark Zuckerberg, are unlikely to testify alive at the New Mexico trial. But the processes can be noticed for some reasons. This is the first stand-alone, state-led case against Meta that has actually been tried in the US. It is also a long case alleging the sexual exploitation of a child that will ultimately rely on technical arguments, including what is meant by “misleading” the public, how the algorithmic function of social media, and what are the protections of Meta and other social media platforms through Section 230.

And, while Meta’s top brass won’t have to appear in person, executive depositions and testimonies from other witnesses could still provide an interesting look into the inner workings of the company as it builds policies around minor users and responds to complaints that claim it didn’t do enough to protect them.

Meta has so far given no indication that it plans to settle. The company denied the allegations, and Meta spokesman Aaron Simpson told WIRED previously, “While New Mexico makes sensationalist, irrelevant, and disruptive arguments, we are focused on demonstrating our long-standing commitment to supporting young people… We are proud of the progress we have made, and we are always working to do better.”

Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project, a tech industry watchdog, said in an emailed statement that these two trials represent “the split screen of Mark Zuckerberg’s nightmares: a landmark trial in Los Angeles about addicted children to Facebook and Instagram, and a trial in New Mexico that exposed how Meta predators use social media to exploit and abuse children.

“These are the trials of a generation,” Haworth added. “As the world watches the courts hold Big Tobacco and Big Pharma accountable, we will, for the first time, see Big Tech CEOs like Zuckerberg take the stand.”

The Cost of Doing Business

New Mexico attorney general Raúl Torrez filed his complaint against Meta in December 2023. In it, he alleged that Meta proactively served minor users explicit content, enabled adults to exploit children on the platform, allowed Facebook and Instagram users to quickly search for child pornography, and allowed a case investigator, posing as a mother, to offering his minor traffickers daughter.

The trial is expected to take place in seven weeks. Last week the jurors were chosen, a panel of 10 women and eight men (12 jurors and six alternates). New Mexico First Judicial District judge Bryan Biedscheid presided over the case.