Internal documents unsealed in ongoing litigation show that the Meta team developing Instagram's Teen Accounts ordered custom baseball caps emblazoned with "a/c priv"—short for attorney-client privilege. Lawyers suing the social media giant point to the 2024 merchandise ordered by the "Project Nido" team as evidence of a systemic effort to shield sensitive internal research on adolescent mental health from public exposure.
The revelation comes amid broader allegations that Meta routinely misapplied legal confidentiality rules to hide internal discussions about safety risks. US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers previously criticized several of Meta's redactions as "entirely inappropriate," citing an instance where executives framed business decisions regarding leak prevention and slide deck publication as confidential legal advice.
Although Meta de-designated roughly 65,000 documents in April 2025 following discovery, plaintiffs contend the delayed disclosure hindered key witness depositions. Meta has requested until the end of the year to re-evaluate remaining privilege claims, while plaintiffs argue that an independent, Meta-funded neutral party should oversee the review process.