Leaked documents from 2023 reveal Instagram’s strategy to bring teens back on app two weeks after dozens of US states sued Meta

Two weeks after several US states filed a lawsuit against Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta for allegedly harming children’s health by hooking adolescents on addictive algorithms, Instagram’s leadership swung into action to win back teens on the app, internal documents from 2023 to 2025 viewed by The Washington Post, have revealed. According to these documents, Instagram head Adam Mosseri directed his team to prioritise teenagers above almost every other business goal.

“As you are building out your 2024 plans, I’m asking that the business teams stay laser focused on 1) teens… and 2) Threads, and in that order,” Mosseri wrote in a November 6, 2023, memo, the report said. It pointed out an ‘aggressive, multiyear campaign’ to reverse a “years-