Those who’ve fought on Capitol Hill to rein in social media platforms see last week’s settlement between Meta and state attorneys general not as a final destination, but as a roadmap to what’s possible. Privacy and First Amendment advocates are worried they’re right.
The settlement comes as the House and Senate have taken divergent paths toward regulating young people’s use of the internet, and it looks likely to inform future conversations about the balance among safety, parental control and young people’s rights in any consensus bill.
Meta agreed to a rash of new controls on Facebook and Instagram: age verification, the option for kids to see a non-personalized feed and a default two-hour time limit for teens. But those new safety standards, which come with an up-to $18 billion payout to states, will only apply to Meta and only for 10 years.
In some cases, like age verification, the settlement goes further than Congress currently seems willing. Legislation and the settlement cover similar ground on personalized algorithms and features associated with greater use, like push notifications, though the settlement is more specific. And, perhaps most controversially, the settlement does not place a “duty of care” on Meta to prevent harm to its young users.
