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A landmark $17.1 billion settlement was announced Wednesday in regard to a multistate settlement with Meta Platforms, Inc. Michigan and Wisconsin were among the 47 states and other American territories that were a part of the coalition. Wisconsin is set to receive at least $219 million and Michigan is set to receive at least $171 million.
In addition to payment, the settlement requires Meta to implement a series of safety features on Instagram and Facebook in the settling jurisdictions, including:
• Strict daily time limits and “productive pauses” for children: Instagram and Facebook would impose a combined two-hour daily time limit with mandatory pauses after 15 minutes of continuous use and again at 60 and 90 minutes to interrupt extended periods of scrolling. These limits remain in effect for five years.
• “Nighttime blocks” restricting children’s access from midnight to 6 a.m.
• Limited school-time access for children, eliminating push notifications on weekdays from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. during the school year.
• Age assurance measures to more effectively verify the age of young users.
• Safer, age-appropriate content controls, including stronger safeguards against bullying, content promoting eating disorders and content related to suicide and self-harm.
• Stronger, more user-friendly parental controls.
• Limits on social comparison features, including certain beauty filters and visible “like” counts, that have been linked to poor mental health outcomes in kids and teens.
Both the implementation and efficacy of the features would be regularly assessed by an independent auditor and a committee of settling states.
“For too many years, social media platforms have traded our children’s mental health for engagement on their apps,” said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel. “This historic settlement holds Meta accountable and puts critical, first-of-its-kind safeguards in place to protect Michigan kids, including daily screen breaks, nighttime access blocks, and the removal of harmful features like public like counts. Now, the responsibility to protect our youth cannot end here. It is my hope that this is a turning point for the entire social media industry to prioritize the safety and well-being of children over their bottom line.”
“This resolution provides for several changes that prioritize kids’ well-being over Meta’s profits—as it should have been all along,” said Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul. “This is a monumental step in changing the role of social media in kids’ lives for the better.”
Beginning in 2021, nearly every attorney general in the country cooperated to investigate the social media industry for allegedly designing and promoting platforms to children and teens despite known harms. After a bipartisan, nationwide investigation uncovered that Meta allegedly designed Instagram’s features to addict children while internally documenting the resulting mental health harms and failing to warn parents, attorneys general across the country sued Meta individually or as part of a consolidated federal lawsuit. This settlement resolves those cases as well as other claims by the settling states and territories. The settlement also involves a payment from Meta arising from its sharing of nonpublic information about Facebook users with third parties, like Cambridge Analytica, leading up to the 2016 election.
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