Meta to pay billions in landmark social media settlement

Teenagers may soon have to find a new midnight hobby besides scrolling Instagram and testing which filter gives them the best cheekbones.

Meta has agreed to pay up to $17.1 billion and overhaul how teenagers use Instagram and Facebook, settling a landmark lawsuit brought by US states over alleged harms to young users.

• The states had accused Meta of intentionally designing Facebook and Instagram to keep kids hooked, and knowingly hiding those risks from the public.
• The case also included claims from 29 states that Meta violated federal children’s privacy law by collecting personal data from users it knew were kids without their parents’ consent, and using that information to train generative AI models.

A teen makeover is coming

As part of the settlement, Meta agreed to implement a slew of restrictions for users under 18. These include:

• Setting a default daily time limit (2 hours) and blocking access between midnight and 6 AM.
• Silencing notifications during school hours and prompting users after every 15 minutes of consecutive use.
• Hiding like counts and disabling cosmetic surgery and makeup filters.
• Offering a “non-personalized feed” that isn’t driven by an algorithm, and doesn’t gear content towards individual users.

A total of 52 US states and territories have signed on to Meta’s settlement and are eligible for payouts, which Meta says will fund “youth online safety initiatives.”

There is a catch: The full value of Meta’s payout depends on whether other social media sites—specifically TikTok and YouTube—also settle with the states and agree to financial penalties and product changes. Meta will initially pay ~$12 billion over the next decade, with the remaining 30% of the settlement ($5+ billion) conditional on states settling with YouTube and TikTok.

Zoom out: Meta still faces numerous other lawsuits from school districts and individuals alleging the social media company’s platforms have harmed children, with some legal battles scheduled for trial in the coming months.