Meta has agreed a settlement with US states and territories to resolve claims that Facebook and Instagram harmed children, with payments of up to $18bn (£13.3bn) pending approval by a California judge. Under the deal, Meta will pay a maximum amount to 48 states, the District of Columbia and three US territories. The payment would be the largest made by the company in child-safety litigation to date. The figure would be distributed in annual instalments over a 10-year period, Meta said. Largest payment Sought In Child Safety CaseThe settlement follows a lawsuit filed in 2023 by 29 states alleging the company breached federal and state child privacy laws. As part of the agreement, most of the US will be covered, although New Mexico is not included. Last month, a federal judge in New Mexico issued a ruling against Meta, describing it as a “public nuisance” similar to air pollution, and ordered combined fines of almost $1bn. New default Limits And Night BlocksAlongside the financial settlement, Meta will introduce changes designed to strengthen protections for children using the platforms. Measures demanded by state attorneys include default daily time limits and blocks during night-time hours. Meta said a feature that blocks notifications between midnight and 6am will be turned on by default, with settings designed to be switched off only by a parent or guardian. Separate “school mode” provisions would mute notifications between 08:00 and 15:00 on school days. The agreement also includes a default two-hour daily time limit for teens, counted cumulatively across Instagram and Facebook, with the ability to disable the limit only with a parent’s permission. If other social media companies introduce similar restrictions, that daily limit would be reduced to one hour, Meta said, citing TikTok, Snap and YouTube as examples. Other changes set out in the settlement include hiding likes on teen profiles and on posts they interact with, prompts that notify users when they reach 15 minutes of continuous use and then at 60 and 90 minutes of cumulative use, and allowing teens to choose a feed that is not driven by an algorithm. Meta will also turn off autoplay for videos and other content for teen users, remove access to extreme make-up filters, and implement limits intended to reduce time spent on the platforms. Trial Before Settlement And Denial Of WrongdoingMeta denied wrongdoing as part of the settlement. In statements on Wednesday, it said the planned changes would be rolled out alongside the payment. The agreement came after a jury trial began last week in Oakland, California. State lawyers argued that Meta knew that millions of Instagram and Facebook users aged 11 and 12 were present on its platforms over the years, but “did little to keep them off”. The five-day trial relied on internal Meta records, including research documents, emails and chat logs reaching senior leadership, state lawyers said. California Attorney General Rob Bonta said on Wednesday that the trial had not gone well for Meta. He also called the settlement “a major moment to clean up an industry that has been hurting our kids”. During court testimony, Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, said Meta was “always working on teen safety” and described ongoing testing and research. The case was settled and court adjourned before he returned to give further testimony. A former Meta researcher, George Volichenko, testified before settlement, describing difficulty in understanding why his team was not given more freedom to test and roll out safety features in 2022. He said that wider adoption of a muted-notifications feature called “quiet mode” was unlikely unless it was enabled by default. Under the settlement, notification blocking at night will be enabled by default. Meta’s chief legal officer, C J Mahoney, said the framework agreed with states would enable parents to manage how children access the platforms. He also said the deal would only work if peers adopt similar safeguards, and urged TikTok and YouTube to implement the same measures. Washington’s District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb called the settlement a “monumental public health victory”, adding that the required safety features would change how young people use Instagram and Facebook. Join the discussion? 27 August 2026
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