Florida rejects Meta's $18B settlement in federal social media safety lawsuit
Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, agreed to pay nearly $18 billion and to make a number of changes to better manage how kids and teens use its social media platforms, to settle a federal lawsuit with more than 50 state attorneys general.
Florida was not part of that settlement, according to Attorney General James Uthmeier.
Meta sued over child safety, privacy, and social media addiction concerns
The backstory:
This week, a federal trial began in California alleging that Facebook and Instagram harmed children and teenagers' mental health by creating features that made them addicted to the apps.
A total of 29 states have filed lawsuits against Meta. Four of those – California, Colorado, Kentucky, and New Jersey – were part of the trial that started this week, the AP said. The other 25 were expected to start later this year.
On Wednesday, court filings indicated that a massive settlement had been proposed. Meta later announced the settlement in its own news release.
The other side:
Florida Attorney James Uthmeier described the settlement as "peanuts" and a "slap on the wrist" for Meta in announcing that Florida did not join the agreement.
"We'll see them at trial," he said.
In a second post on X, this time quoting Meta's news release regarding the settlement, Uthmeier said: "Corporations like Meta will never learn a lesson if they don’t incur real costs for breaking the law."
What changes is Meta looking to make to Facebook, Instagram?
Dig deeper:
In a news release, Meta announced a number of safety changes that it agreed to make as part of the settlement agreement:
- Implementing a 2-hour daily time limit for both Facebook and Instagram for teens (parents can turn that feature off)
- Night Mode: Blocks usage between midnight and 6 a.m.
- School Mode: Mutes notifications between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m.
- Usage prompts: Teens will receive notifications after 15 minutes of scrolling and when their usage hits 60 minutes and 90 minutes.
- Likes and reactions will be hidden on posts.
- Teens will not be able to use extreme makeup or cosmetic photo filters
- Autoplay will be turned off by default
- More parental controls, including notifying parents when a teen links to a secondary account, interactions with suspicious accounts, and updates on a teen's usage or attempts to change their settings.
Meta asks YouTube, TikTok to make similar changes
In its press release, Meta acknowledged that teens move between several apps, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
"All platforms should empower parents and support teens by putting the same measures in place, because we know that when teens are restricted on one app, they simply move to another," Meta said.
"For meaningful progress to happen, we urge TikTok and YouTube to join us and state attorneys general in adopting this new standard, to ensure teens use social media in a healthy and responsible way."
It was not immediately clear if YouTube or TikTok had issued statements in response to Meta's settlement and request.
TikTok recently settled a 2024 lawsuit with the Department of Justice over children's privacy for $400 million, the AP reported.
The Source: Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier posted his reaction to the proposed Meta lawsuit in posts on X from his official account. Meta posted an online news release detailing the settlement and changes it planned to make. Additional information is from the proposed settlement filed in federal court in California and obtained by FOX's KTVU.