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Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

cnn.com

11–20 of 579 posts

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#11
post #5

Another poster child for Meta's lobbying (bribery) to encourage OS level age verification. (numerous recent references in HN posts) They very much want to push this liability off onto someone else... As far as end-to-end encryption, on SM sites (social media or SadoMasochism, however you want to read it) I don't really see the need.

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Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#12
post #5

Another poster child for Meta's lobbying (bribery) to encourage OS level age verification. (numerous recent references in HN posts) They very much want to push this liability off onto someone else... As far as end-to-end encryption, on SM sites (social media or SadoMasochism, however you want to read it) I don't really see the need.

You were downvoted, but right. Meta wants to be able to say, "hey, the OS said she was 18!" and not get in trouble for it. Online child exploitation should be a strict liability offense.

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Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#13
> The New Mexico attorney general’s office created multiple fake Facebook and Instagram profiles posing as children as part of its investigation into Meta. Those test accounts encountered sexually suggestive content and requests to share pornographic content, the suit alleges.

> The fake child accounts were allegedly contacted and solicited for sex by the three New Mexico adult men who were arrested in May of 2024. Two of the three men were arrested at a motel, where they allegedly believed they would be meeting up with a 12-year-old girl, based on their conversations with the decoy accounts.

and

> “The product is very good at connecting people with interests, and if your interest is little girls, it will be really good at connecting you with little girls,” Bejar said.

This is what it's about right? The article doesn't make it seem like encryption is meaningfully part of this case at all.

> Midway through trial, Meta said it would stop supporting end-to-end-encrypted messaging on Instagram later this year.

There's no indication that that decision, or the announcement, are directly related to the trial, just they just happened at the same time? It's a link drawn by CNN, without presenting any clear connection

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#14
post #4

Many will cheer for any case that hurts Meta without reading the details, but we should be aware that these cases are one of the key reasons why companies are backtracking from features like end-to-end encryption: > The New Mexico case also raised concerns that allowing teens to use end-to-end encryption on Instagram chats — a privacy measure that blocks anyone other than sender and receiver from viewing a conversati…

Is it illegal or is it just illegal on general purpose platforms whose focus isn't extreme security?

We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats (otherwise they wouldn't do it) and they're using E2EE as an excuse to avoid liability for the things their platform encourages. Contrast this with something like Signal where the entire point is to be secure.

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#15
post #14
post #4

Many will cheer for any case that hurts Meta without reading the details, but we should be aware that these cases are one of the key reasons why companies are backtracking from features like end-to-end encryption: > The New Mexico case also raised concerns that allowing teens to use end-to-end encryption on Instagram chats — a privacy measure that blocks anyone other than sender and receiver from viewing a conversati…

Is it illegal or is it just illegal on general purpose platforms whose focus isn't extreme security? We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats (otherwise they wouldn't do it) and they're using E2EE as an excuse to avoid liability for the things their platform encourages. Contrast this with something like Signal where the entire point is to be secure.

> We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats

That can't be true, otherwise in what sense is it E2EE?

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#16
post #9
post #5

Another poster child for Meta's lobbying (bribery) to encourage OS level age verification. (numerous recent references in HN posts) They very much want to push this liability off onto someone else... As far as end-to-end encryption, on SM sites (social media or SadoMasochism, however you want to read it) I don't really see the need.

> As far as end-to-end encryption, on SM sites (social media or SadoMasochism, however you want to read it) I don't really see the need. You don't see any benefit to allowing people to encrypt their private communications in a way that can't be accessed by the company? It's weird to see tech news commenters swing from being pro-privacy to anti-privacy when the topic of social media sites come up.

Meta has a way to read your E2EE messages. I don't know what it is, but if they didn't then they wouldn't do it.

There's a difference between E2EE between friends who want to remain secure, and E2EE between strangers in an attempt for the platform to avoid legal liability for spam.

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You were downvoted, but right. Meta wants to be able to say, "hey, the OS said she was 18!" and not get in trouble for it. Online child exploitation should be a strict liability offense.

How does this apply to, say, Signal?

That's why Signal requires a phone number. You can't talk to people you don't know because complete strangers don't give you their phone number. And if you do spam random numbers, they'll report you to the police and you can be tracked down based on your identifier, which still doesn't leak the chats between you and people you actually know.

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#18
post #4

Many will cheer for any case that hurts Meta without reading the details, but we should be aware that these cases are one of the key reasons why companies are backtracking from features like end-to-end encryption: > The New Mexico case also raised concerns that allowing teens to use end-to-end encryption on Instagram chats — a privacy measure that blocks anyone other than sender and receiver from viewing a conversati…

> Many will cheer for any case that hurts Meta

Absolutely. Particularly where they've been found to be guilty.

> but we should be aware that these cases are one of the key reasons why companies are backtracking from features like end-to-end encryption

Why _social media_ companies are backtracking. I'm extremely nonplussed by this outcome.

> concerns that allowing teens

Yes, because that's what we all had in mind when considering the victims and perpetrators of these crimes.

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#19
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it illegal or is it just illegal on general purpose platforms whose focus isn't extreme security? We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats (otherwise they wouldn't do it) and they're using E2EE as an excuse to avoid liability for the things their platform encourages. Contrast this with something like Signal where the entire point is to be secure.

> We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats That can't be true, otherwise in what sense is it E2EE?

In the sense that calling it E2EE gives people a warm fuzzy feeling and makes people send more sensitive information over the platform.

Has anyone actually audited it?

Re: Jury finds Meta liable in case over child sexual exploitation on its platforms

#20
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it illegal or is it just illegal on general purpose platforms whose focus isn't extreme security? We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats (otherwise they wouldn't do it) and they're using E2EE as an excuse to avoid liability for the things their platform encourages. Contrast this with something like Signal where the entire point is to be secure.

> We all know Meta can still read E2EE chats That can't be true, otherwise in what sense is it E2EE?

I mean you can read it in your app and they're not just stored on your phone. E2E just means in transport from what I understand.
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