In one of the largest tech settlements in history, Meta has agreed to pay up to $18 billion to resolve lawsuits from 47 US states, the District of Columbia, and US territories alleging the company violated child privacy laws and deliberately designed addictive features targeting minors.
The settlement, announced August 26, effectively ends a landmark federal trial in California's Northern District, where states had sought roughly $200 billion in damages. Separately, Meta settled with Texas for approximately $1 billion over similar allegations.
The agreement requires sweeping changes to Facebook and Instagram: - Limiting teens to a cumulative two hours of screen time per day across both platforms - Blocking access to most features between midnight and 6 AM - Muting push notifications from 8 AM to 3 PM on school days (except direct messages and safety alerts) - Enabling "take a break" prompts by default after every 15 minutes of scrolling - Hiding like counts for users under 18 by default
The case exposed damning internal documents showing Meta knew millions of Instagram users were under 13 — the minimum age required by the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). Internal reports presented to CEO Mark Zuckerberg documented four million underage Instagram users, while the company's age-estimation algorithms confirmed millions of accounts belonged to children.
Former Meta data scientist George Volichenko testified that when he raised concerns about low adoption of safety features, he was told not to worry because "the team exists partially to protect the company against the upcoming lawsuits."
Meta also agreed to establish an independent social media research foundation to share user data with researchers studying the effects of social media on well-being — a significant concession given the company dramatically curtailed internal research after the Frances Haugen revelations in 2021.
However, Meta is seeking to leverage the settlement competitively: the two-hour time limit and notification restrictions will remain for only five years unless YouTube and TikTok adopt the same measures, in which case they extend to 10 years. The full $17.1 billion payment is contingent on YouTube, TikTok, and Snap also settling their cases and agreeing to similar product changes.
The settlement comes as nearly six in 10 Americans support banning social media for users under 16, and at least 10 countries have already passed or implemented such bans.
