As You Sow,<\/em> filed a shareholder resolution documenting more than 45 million images of child sexual abuse and torture tied to sex trafficking on Facebook. It filed resolutions for five consecutive years asking for the social network to protect its customers, employees, and shareholders, repair its fraying brand reputation, improve platform integrity, adopt self-regulation, and avoid the destruction of shareholder value associated with the serious and sometimes fatal harm that the company\u2019s platform was enabling.\u00a0<\/p>\nIn 2020, faith-based investors brought a sex-trafficking survivor before Meta\u2019s annual meeting, a woman groomed on Facebook between the ages of 15 to 18, then sexually trafficked. That year we filed the \u201cReboot Facebook\u201d proposal, asking the company to verify accounts, remove the abuse images, and stop running political ads containing known lies.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In 2021, our content governance resolution won 63.1% of the independent shareholder vote, but once Zuckerberg\u2019s outsized votes were considered, the headline tally reported was 19%. Two-thirds of shareholders \u2013 those who bear Meta\u2019s financial risk \u2014 voted for the company to address these dangers before they became a crisis for shareholders. One man\u2019s vote overrode them all and now every shareholder and a generation of children are paying the price.<\/p>\n
The settlement may seem large, but it may be just the tip of the iceberg. The plaintiffs\u2019 own models put the damages in the trillions; this payout, spread over 10 years, is roughly 2% of that \u2014 and it\u2019s contingent. If YouTube and TikTok decline to join, Meta\u2019s obligation falls to about $12 billion and the teen safeguards never take effect. Meta\u2019s legal team openly admitted that they engineered the settlement terms to establish an \u201cindustry standard\u201d rather than being singled out. We\u2019ve seen this movie before. The 1998 tobacco Master Settlement made the biggest players the authors of their own rulebook, and they emerged more dominant than ever. Meta\u2019s lawyers have no doubt read that history.<\/p>\n
Worse, the fixes may not protect children at all. Age verification is \u201cbest-effort,\u201d so when a twelve-year-old enters an adult birthdate or opens a new account, Meta can claim, as it has for years, that it \u201cmade best efforts.\u201d And the deal ignores the hate speech tied to lynch mobs abroad and the platform\u2019s role in sex trafficking.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Meta previously lost two cases in New Mexico this year: $375 million in March, $567 million in August, for creating a public nuisance. A Los Angeles jury found Meta and Alphabet negligent in platform design. Thousands of suits remain, with trials resuming in October and many more billions of dollars in costs at stake.<\/p>\n
The company found negligent by a jury has defined the child-safety standard for its whole industry, while still benefitting as an incumbent from a platform that remains mostly unchanged. A settlement that low-balls the monetary damages for harm to a whole generation, admits no wrongdoing, and entrenches market share, is a fine outcome for management but a poor one for shareholders who retain the litigation exposure, the brand damage, and the defective product. It is the type of deal we would expect from an unaccountable executive like Zuckerberg.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So, what fixes the underlying problem? It\u2019s maddeningly basic: One share, one vote.<\/p>\n
One federal agency could help solve this massive challenge to protect shareholders, but the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is only making matters worse. It recently initiated a proceeding to rescind Rule 14a-8, the very rule that allows shareholders to submit proposals. It is just the latest in a relentless and short-sighted campaign to restrict and eliminate the exchange of information between shareholders and the public companies they own.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Meta\u2019s CEO has demonstrated that he requires oversight in a system that incentivizes profiting from the harm to a generation of children. Regulators are moving in the opposite direction by silencing the vast majority of shareholders. Now is the time for all stakeholders to come together and protect our rights by removing dual class share structures and making sure one man cannot damage a whole generation of children ever again.<\/p>\n
The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of <\/em>Fortune.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n#flawed #system #mans #hubris #cost #Meta #shareholders #billion<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Meta has agreed to pay up to $… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4394,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[432,225,7363,7365,7364,849,850,7366,925,3702],"class_list":["post-4393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-news","tag-billion","tag-cost","tag-flawed","tag-hubris","tag-mans","tag-mark-zuckerberg","tag-meta","tag-shareholders","tag-social-media","tag-system"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/p>\n