The proceedings are being held in the United States and Australia but the media coverage is reverberating around the world, predicting how social media will evolve in the next few years.
In a US Court in Oakland on Tuesday, it was alleged that Meta (which owns Facebook) knowingly hooked and exploited children, with accusations that the company deliberately made Instagram and Facebook addictive to young users.
Meta “exploited how kids’ brains work”, California prosecutor Megan O’Neill said in opening arguments, painting Meta’s business model as one built to “hook the users, hold them for as long as they can, harvest their data, and then hide the truth from the public.”
Meanwhile, according to Reuters, 29 US states have grouped to accuse Meta of designing its platforms in ways that “encourage addictive behaviour, fail to verify users’ ages, encourage adolescents to bypass parental controls, and have inadequate safeguards against harmful content and/or intentionally amplify harmful and exploitative content”, according to the filings at the Court of Appeal in California.
Two weeks ago, a judge in New Mexico, the US, ordered Facebook and Instagram owner Meta to pay US$567 million (RM2.2 billion) and change how its platforms function for young users in the state after finding the company is to blame for harming children’s mental health.
After this latest ruling, judge Bryan Biedscheid said the bulk of the money, US$420 million (RM1.7 billion), will be used for treatment services for young people.
The rest will go towards awareness and prevention, screening services and other costs over the next five years.
Australia cracks the whip
In Brisbane, Meta, which is facing a Senate inquiry probing the extent of racism against First Nations Australians, said it is "not aware" whether any of its content moderators are Indigenous.
(A content moderator is responsible for responding to posts that violate the company's content policies.)
Australia's Human Rights Commission and Indigenous advocacy groups have previously told the inquiry that online hatred against Indigenous people has increased since the failed 2023 referendum to create an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.
But what was more appalling was that an investigation by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) found that Facebook's parent company, Meta, is directly paying several controversial content creators, including a white nationalist with Neo-Nazi links and a prominent anti-vaxxer.
The ABC NEWS Verify investigation found content produced by these creators appears to be, at times, in direct violation of Facebook's own policies on content monetisation.
Facebook distributed nearly US$3 billion (RM12 billion) to an estimated 16.2 million monetised accounts last year.
ABC quoted the NGO, What To Fix executive director Victoire Rio, as saying that, in effect, Facebook was in a business relationship with these people and organisations.
“If we consider that Meta is in a direct commercial relationship with its publishers, insofar as they're paying them royalties and that they have a monetisation agreement with them, then you could argue that they are liable for the content that gets produced by their business partner in some ways,” she said.
What about Malaysia?
So, what does this have to do with Malaysia and its people, who are separated by thousands of miles of sea?
Questions have to be asked because Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil appears to be mollycoddling Facebook instead of wielding the “kanda” stick.
In May last year, he said the government was considering legal action against Facebook for its “lack of cooperation” in tackling online scams, adding that he would leave it to the MCMC to engage with the social media giant on the matter.
“In my opinion, legal action may have to be taken, but I leave it to the MCMC on this, and give them (Facebook) a last opportunity to prove that they do want to cooperate with the government,” New Straits Times quoted him as saying.
Five months later, Fahmi said the government submitted a total of 168,774 content takedown requests to Meta on Facebook, which is 59 percent of all content takedown requests to all social media platforms.
“This number shows that Meta has still failed to fully cooperate in combating cybercrime activities. This has affected the authorities’ efforts to protect the people from the increasing threat of online crime.
“However, Meta has assured that it will increase its efforts and cooperation to ensure that illegal content can be dealt with more effectively,” he said.
On Tuesday, he was at it again, saying that Facebook is responsible for 78 percent of online gambling content identified for removal in Malaysia from January to August.
“Facebook commits ‘most sins’ against Malaysians with online gambling, scams,” and sarcastically noted that there should be an annual award for the social media platform that “commits the most sins” against Malaysians, Malay Mail Online reported.
“So, the perpetrator of the sin, or the party that enables the most scams, is Facebook. We should have an award every year for which platform commits the most sins against the people of Malaysia,” he said.
Authorities must act
So, how long will this charade go on? There are enough clauses in the Communications and Multimedia Commission Act (CMA) to compel compliance, but why aren’t they being used?
What about the moderators? Are they local or someone sitting in one corner of the world deciding what Malaysians should have access to?
What about payments to the rabble-rousers and race baiters? Malaysians have a right to know, and Fahmi is not helping by repeating his mantra in the hope that Meta will comply.
Meta’s courtroom reckoning in the US and Australia is not some distant spectacle - it is a warning shot for Malaysia.
When judges abroad are ordering billion-dollar payouts and exposing how children were deliberately hooked, when inquiries reveal that Meta is paying extremists and racists while disclaiming responsibility, Malaysians should be asking why our own government is still pleading for cooperation instead of enforcing the law.
Fahmi’s repeated laments and sarcastic “award” quips may make headlines, but they do not protect Malaysians from scams, gambling syndicates, racists, or hate speech.
The CMA already provides the teeth to compel compliance. What is missing is the will to bite.
If Meta can be forced to pay for the damage it caused in New Mexico, if it can be dragged before a Senate inquiry in Brisbane, then Malaysia too must stop mollycoddling and start compelling.
Our children, communities, and democracy cannot afford any delay. The time for polite reminders has passed. The time for decisive action is now. - Mkini
R NADESWARAN is a veteran journalist who strives to uphold the ethos of civil rights leader John Lewis: “When you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have to speak up. You have to say something; you have to do something.” Comments: citizen.nades22@gmail.com.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.
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