After a scathing Meta-funded study correctly noted that Instagram causes body problems in girls, Mark Zuckerberg emailed his staff with a confusing, logically flawed complaint that Apple faces less criticism for similar issues.
I don’t understand how Mark Zuckerberg isn’t more clear that there is a huge difference between a public social media platform and private messages.
Going back a bit, it all came to light as New Mexico is suing Met. The New Mexico Attorney General’s filing points to Meta’s claims that its platforms are safe for teens. At the same time, Meta conducted internal research that claimed that Instagram, at least absolutely, was not and was a major contributor to the rise of body image issues among teenagers.
An email from Zuckerberg, revealed in the process of discovering a lawsuit about the issue he reported on The Verge revealed a complaint from Meta’s CEO on Thursday. And as you’d expect, given the history over the years, it’s more logical fallacies that complain about Apple.
From email:
“Apple, for example, doesn’t seem to be studying any of this. From what I understand, they don’t have anyone controlling or moderating content, and they don’t even have a message flow in iMessage. They’ve taken the approach that it’s people’s own responsibility for what they do on the platform, and by Apple not taking that responsibility, they haven’t created the staff or the plethora of business studies that surprise them.”
At least there’s a spam reporting feature in Messages, so they’re at least partially wrong in that regard. Apple includes the ability to block anyone from seeing explicit images in Messages, a feature that is enabled by default for users under 18, so they’re wrong there too.
And he is also 100% wrong about the Apple studies.
Around the same time that Meta conducted its body image study that turned out to be wrong, Apple commissioned its own studies on child sexual abuse material (CSAM). They were clear that they did at the time of the announcement and when Apple ended the effort.
Zuckerberg whined to employees that Apple was not held to the same standard.
“When Apple tried to do something with CSAM, they were heavily criticized for it,” Zuckerberg said. “(It) may encourage them to double down on their original approach.”
But Zuckerberg is right about one thing. When Apple tried to implement this CSAM scanning on devices after studies, the company was widely criticized for it. This was mostly because people didn’t understand how it worked and saw it as an invasion of privacy.
The CEO of Meta went on to complain about how his platforms seemed to have more material to moderate than all the others, and he had to put it on the news. Zuckerberg believed that this made his companies look like there was more of this material than anywhere else.
Let’s make it simple: Apple is not responsible for what Meta users post. A comparison of individuals is not possible here.
Being upset about it in an email to staff is ridiculous.
Apple does not have two social networks that require moderation under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. To say that Apple is somehow getting preferential treatment is ludicrous because Apple clearly doesn’t fall under 230.
It is an evergreen. We can count on Mark Zuckerberg complaining about Apple for one reason or another at least every year. It is generally unfounded and certainly self-interested. And also generally insensitive.
But that’s okay. He gets what he wants and Apple starts verifying the age of users. That way, Zuckerberg can blame Apple for the problem when someone bypasses age verification and sees something they shouldn’t on Zuckerberg’s incredibly poorly moderated platforms.
The problem never seems to be Facebook. It’s never Instagram, which has proven itself to be absolutely damaging to the mental health of American teenage girls.
No. It must be because Apple isn’t doing enough to help Meta, on Apple’s dime. Again.