Meta as a “marketplace for predators” says recent investigation
Meta recently lost a multi-million-dollar legal battle over its failure to prevent children from being sexually exploited on its platforms like Facebook and Instagram. New details reveal how evidence was uncovered, and the investigation that helped secure this historic case.
Journalist Katie McQue began the investigation in 2021 after receiving a tip that child sex trafficking in the United States was surging—and that predators were using Facebook and Instagram to facilitate it.
Inside a hidden digital marketplace
Much of the abuse took place out of public view. Traffickers used Facebook Messenger and private Instagram accounts to identify vulnerable children, build trust, and then sexually exploit them.
To uncover evidence, reporters combed through US federal court records and Department of Justice filings. What they found was explicit and deeply alarming. Published in an investigation for The Guardian, McQue explains:
I was able to pull transcripts of sale negotiations for teen girls that traffickers were engaging in on Facebook Messenger, the private messaging function. In exhibit documents, there were pictures of trafficking victims being advertised for sale in Instagram’s Stories function. Money and logistics had been discussed. In the cases we found, none of these crimes had been detected or flagged by Meta.
These were not isolated incidents. In case after case, traffickers used Meta’s platforms to arrange payments, coordinate logistics, and exploit children. Further, the investigation exposed deeper systemic negligence. Former Meta employees, whose job it was to report and remove harmful content on Facebook and Instagram, reviewed extreme abuse daily, only to see reports ignored or dismissed. According to a complaint by New Mexico’s attorney general, “Meta has allowed Facebook and Instagram to become a marketplace for predators in search of children upon whom to prey.”
McQue says:
Many were traumatised by the content they had had to review each day. All said their efforts to flag and escalate possible child trafficking on Meta platforms often went nowhere, and harmful content was rarely taken down by the company.