By Paul Joseph
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has agreed to pay up to $18 billion to settle claims brought by 29 US states that its platforms harmed children.
The agreement, which is subject to final court approval, requires Meta to introduce a range of new protections for users under 18, including daily time limits and overnight restrictions on its platforms.
Under the settlement, teenage users will have a default two-hour daily limit and their accounts will be blocked between midnight and 06:00, unless a parent lifts the restrictions.
Notifications for under-18s will also be restricted between 22:00 and 07:00 and during school hours, while Meta has agreed to strengthen mechanisms for young users to report potentially harmful content.
The company will also stop displaying like and reaction counts to users under 18, prohibit cosmetic-procedure image filters for them and offer an option for non-personalised feeds.
Meta has agreed to improve parental supervision tools and introduce stronger age-assurance measures aimed at identifying under-18 users and removing children under 13 from its services.
The settlement follows a lawsuit filed in 2023 by 29 states, including California and New York, which accused Meta of designing Facebook and Instagram in ways that could encourage addictive use among children and teenagers.
The states also alleged that Meta violated child privacy laws, collected and used children’s personal data improperly and misled consumers about the safety of its platforms for young users.
Meta has denied the allegations and said the settlement does not represent an admission of wrongdoing or liability.
The company said the agreement builds on its existing efforts to support teenagers and parents, while calling on rival platforms TikTok and YouTube to adopt similar measures.
Meta said approximately 70% of the settlement, around $12.7 billion, will be distributed to participating states over 10 years. The remaining 30% is linked to conditions involving YouTube and TikTok adopting similar safeguards and making matching payments.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta described the agreement as a major step towards making social media safer for children, saying the changes would bring enforceable protections to Facebook and Instagram.
Washington DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb called the settlement “a monumental public health victory” for young people and said the measures would fundamentally change how children use Meta’s platforms.
Meta is also expected to strengthen its age-verification technology and has called on Apple and Google to provide verified age information through their app stores.
The majority of the settlement terms will remain in place for 10 years, although some headline restrictions, including the daily time limit and overnight block, will initially last five years unless other major platforms agree to introduce comparable measures.
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