The lawsuit was filed in the Federal Court by eight people seeking redress after being exposed to harmful content or developing an addiction to social media, according to a statement released Wednesday by the law firm Minter Ellison.
The Sydney-based court issued on Monday a ban on publishing any details about the case or the identities of the initiators of the class action, according to court documents.
“We will defend ourselves vigorously.”, said a Meta spokesperson in a statement.
William Nolan of the law firm said that this action raised “important questions about how social media platforms are designed and operated and their impact on children and teenagers in Australia.”
In the same statement, Litigation Lending Services announced that it would finance the class action; without this, the company asserts, “Australian families would have no real way to pursue these complaints against a global tech giant.”
In August, Meta had agreed to pay just over $17 billion in the United States to settle one case, the American company having been accused of deliberately designing its platforms to foster dependence among its young users.
