Meta accepts up to $18 billion and limits teen use to two hours

Meta announced on August 26 a settlement worth up to approximately $18 billion with a cross-party coalition of U.S. state attorneys general, pending court approval. This is reported, based on the court filing and the company’s blog, by CNN Business and TechCrunch; the financial terms are also reported by BleepingComputer based on the attorneys general’s statement.

The agreement closes the lawsuit filed in 2023 by 29 states and adds to agreements with other states and territories: a total of over $17.6 billion allocated to 48 states, Washington DC, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands. The company has not admitted any liability, and an independent auditor will oversee compliance with the commitments.

What changes in the products

The non-monetary component is the one affecting how the platforms operate. For ten years, Meta commits to limiting teenagers’ use of Facebook and Instagram to two hours per day and to blocking access between midnight and six in the morning, unless parents consent otherwise. Also included are the hiding of “like” counts from teenagers, blocking filters that simulate cosmetic surgery procedures, a non-personalized content feed that users can choose to activate, and new age verification technologies.

Settlement item	Amount
Total announced	up to approximately $18 billion
Amount already allocated among 48 states and territories	over $17.6 billion
Portion contingent on TikTok and YouTube joining in	$5.3 billion
Closure of privacy claims (Cambridge Analytica case)	$459 million

The contingent clause is the most unusual element: approximately $5.3 billion will be paid only if YouTube and TikTok adopt similar one-hour daily limits and each pay an equivalent amount. In practice, part of the settlement is tied to the behavior of two competitors that are not party to the agreement.

The allocation among states

According to CNN Business and BleepingComputer, California would receive the highest amount, between $1.5 and $2.2 billion; New York and Texas over one billion each. The available sources do not report the criteria by which the sums were allocated among the 48 participating states and territories, nor the earmarked use of the funds in individual state budgets.

Open questions

The agreement is not final: it requires the judge’s approval, and the available sources do not indicate a hearing date. It is not specified how the new age verification technologies will confirm that a user is a minor, nor what the penalty would be for non-compliance with the decade-long commitments. It is not clarified whether the hourly limits apply only in the United States or in other markets, and there are no public reactions from TikTok and YouTube regarding the clause concerning them.

The time constraint, however, is set in writing: ten years of product commitments, with an external auditor tasked with verifying them, and $459 million already allocated to closing the litigation over privacy related to the Cambridge Analytica case.