Jury selection begins in Nashville on Monday in the first of a series of US state trials accusing Meta Platforms of deliberately designing Instagram to be addictive for teenagers, a legal offensive that could force changes to core features such as autoplay, Reels and notifications. The Tennessee attorney general alleges the company violated consumer protection law by concealing internal research that, according to court filings, showed the platform harmed adolescent mental health. A New Mexico jury earlier this year found Meta misled consumers, resulting in a $375 million award, and nearly every US state has filed similar claims.

Meta denies the allegations, arguing that it has built age-appropriate safety controls and that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act shields it from liability for user-generated content. A separate federal trial, consolidating claims from 29 states that the company violated children’s data protection law, is scheduled for August in California. Simultaneously, a California federal judge declined to block Meta from laying off 26 employees who allege the company used AI-driven productivity metrics to target workers with disabilities or medical leave, a case that, according to the plaintiffs’ lawyers, raises ‘serious questions’ about algorithmic bias in workforce decisions. The layoffs, part of a 10% global reduction, are set to be finalised on 22 July.

Viewed from a corporate strategy perspective, Meta is simultaneously negotiating a potential $10bn deal to lease computing power to AI firm Anthropic, according to a person familiar with the talks. The two-year agreement, proposed by Anthropic in June, would mark Meta’s entry into the cloud infrastructure market, diversifying revenue beyond advertising at a moment when its core social media business faces intensifying regulatory and legal headwinds. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg told shareholders in May that entering cloud computing was ‘definitely on the table’.

In Latin America, Colombian civil society groups have documented a pattern of arbitrary account suspensions on Meta platforms targeting progressive content on sexual and reproductive health, feminism and LGBTIQ+ rights. The organisation Repro Uncensored links the increase to Meta’s decision, coinciding with the start of the second Trump administration, to scale back hate-speech and gender-focused moderation filters. European Union officials have already concluded that Meta’s engagement-based ranking design must be altered, and a Dutch court is set to hear arguments that the company’s algorithms censor minority voices in violation of the bloc’s Digital Services Act. Colombian legislators, by contrast, have yet to pass comparable digital platform accountability laws, leaving users with limited recourse, according to local advocacy groups.

The Tennessee trial is expected to last seven weeks, with a second phase on penalties and mandated design changes to follow if the jury finds a violation. The federal children’s data trial opens on 18 August, while the Anthropic cloud negotiations remain in early stages and may not result in a deal. The layoffs challenged in the AI discrimination case are proceeding, though the judge indicated he may revisit his ruling as evidence on the use of AI in the redundancy process emerges.