Instagram head Mosseri says few teens knew of safety feature in addiction trial
- On Tuesday in Oakland federal court, Adam Mosseri was on the defense of Instagram’s safety record, challenging the significance that a state prosecutor gave to the limited use of a feature designed to break up prolonged usage by teens, according to the Associated Press.
He is a central witness for California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey, four of the 29 states that sued Meta in 2023 alleging it knowingly designed features to addict children.
Jason Slothouber, a senior prosecutor with the Colorado Attorney General’s Office, questioned him for about an hour. Mosseri has run Instagram since 2018 and returns to the stand Wednesday.
Take a Break feature worked for the few who switched it on
The Take a Break feature sends a pop-up once someone has been in the app for a set stretch of time, suggesting they stop scrolling. Until late 2024 it was optional, so a teenager had to go into settings and turn it on.
An internal document admitted into evidence showed that at one point, 1.8% of teenagers had it switched on, per NPR. Around the time it launched, Mosseri wrote in a blog post that more than 90% of the people who turned it on kept it running. The first number indicates the amount of teenagers who chose it. The second indicates its performance among that small group.
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