Meta has agreed to pay upto $16.7 billion to settle a major lawsuit brought by US states over allegations that its social media platforms failed to adequately protect children and teenagers.
The settlement was reached less than a quarter of the way through an expected 19-day federal trial involving allegations against Facebook and Instagram. The agreement covers 51 US states and territories and also requires Meta to make significant changes to how teenagers use its platforms.
“Ensuring teens have a safe and productive experience on our platforms is an absolute imperative for Meta. We want to get this right for parents and teens, and that’s why we partnered with state attorneys general to set a new industry standard,” the company said in a post.
Under the proposed settlement, teenagers will receive stronger default protections on Facebook and Instagram. The platforms will impose a two-hour daily usage limit, with parental approval required if a teen wants to disable it. The limit would not cover direct messaging or long-form audio and video.
Meta also plans to restrict overnight access for teen accounts, blocking the apps by default between midnight and 6 am. During the school year, notifications will be muted from 8 am to 3 pm, while users will receive reminders after extended periods of continuous use.
Parents will gain additional controls as well. They will be able to choose chronological feeds instead of algorithmically ranked feeds and disable autoplay. Like and reaction counts will also be hidden by default for teenage users. Meta has additionally agreed to disable certain cosmetic-surgery and extreme-makeup filters for teens.
The financial terms are more complicated than the headline figure suggests. About $12.7 billion is guaranteed, to be paid over a decade. The remaining amount depends on whether other major social media companies adopt comparable protections. If those companies make similar changes, Meta’s own daily usage limit could eventually fall from two hours to one.
The states’ case centered on allegations that Meta violated federal child-privacy laws by collecting information from children under 13. Several states also accused the company of misleading parents about protections for young users and of designing features that contributed to harmful patterns of use.
Meta has denied the allegations.
During the trial, former and current employees were questioned about whether the company placed user engagement ahead of the well-being of young people. Experts also testified about research connecting heavy social media use among adolescents with negative mental-health outcomes.
Evidence presented in court highlighted the limited adoption of some of Meta’s existing safety features. For example, Instagram’s “Take a Break” tool was reportedly used by fewer than 1 percent of weekly teen users several months after launch, with adoption reaching only about 1.8 percent two years later.
The settlement also includes continuing oversight. Meta will face independent auditing, must develop stronger parental-supervision tools, and will be prohibited from making misleading claims about the safety features it provides.
The agreement still requires judicial approval. If finalised, however, it would represent one of the most significant settlements yet involving the alleged effects of social media on children.
