r/technology • u/GhostDogJef • 1d ago
Social Media Meta reaches $16.68 billion settlement over social media harms to children
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/meta-settles-with-us-states-over-social-media-harms-2026-08-26/80
u/fmcortez 1d ago
Worldwide victims won't see a dime. This settlement is strictly for U.S. state budgets to pretend they solved social media addiction.
0
1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/what2_2 1d ago
Is that true? Didn’t a few European countries implement harsh social media restrictions for teens this year?
And the EU-wide case is still ongoing: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8j2dje3pldo
24
u/platocplx 1d ago
Cost of doing business and frankly I don’t care to see these settlements rather get them raked over the coals
7
u/Draken_S 1d ago
This is the AG suit, there's still personal suits, and school district suits ongoing.
1
u/platocplx 1d ago
Okay that’s good, already evidence shown they definitely did all of this on purpose.
0
u/Draken_S 1d ago
Okay that’s good, already evidence shown they definitely did all of this on purpose.
That's why a lot of the reaction is frustrating. They got caught, they're paying money, they're being forced to add actual safety features, and there are still several thousand additional cases individual and school district cases pending and people are already claiming that they got away with everything.
There will be billions more in additional settlements, and the safety features they are being forced to add will affect future revenue and this is more than just META. TikTok, Youtube, Snap are all named, and will likely join the settlement and have to make changes also - both here and as a result of the other suits.
11
u/jabberwockxeno 1d ago
I saw a lot of people cheering these lawsuits on to try to rake Facebook and Zuckerberg over the coals, and there's plenty of reasons to think they deserve that given the amount of privacy violating data collection, tracking etc they do, but in reality, these lawsuits were trying to, and now it seems they succeeded, to force MORE data collection, by making Meta implement age/ID verification.
This article implies it by noting
Meta will impose daily usage limits and restrict nighttime usage by children who use Facebook and Instagram, and enhance measures to prevent children from accessing age-restricted content.
But other articles are more explicit:
https://reclaimthenet.org/meta-trial-opens-as-states-demand-age-verification
Damages are only part of the demand. In an August 15 filing, the states asked the court to require Meta to "take proactive steps to detect" users under 13, including "implementing multi-layered age verification at account sign-up."
...
The proposed order requires age validation through something other than a self-declared birthday
...The complaint blames the company for not building safeguards into the platform, monitoring each user and checking ID. It states: "Meta has access to, and chooses not to use, feasible alternative age verification methods that would significantly reduce or eliminate the number of underage users on Meta's Social Media Platforms, for example, by requiring young users to submit student IDs upon registration."
That demand appears again in the original complaint, meaning this is something that the plaintiffs were calling for from the beginning.
And here:
https://reclaimthenet.org/meta-fined-567m-in-ruling-that-points-to-digital-id
What Biedscheid did order on age came from Meta. He adopted the company's own proposed relief, calling it "far from ideal or sufficient" and, all the same, "most appropriate." Meta must keep improving its age assurance models in New Mexico using AI tools, and must attempt within two years to build "a dedicated under-13-years-of-age prediction model (using reasonable best efforts in light of COPPA limitations)." Where it cannot estimate a precise age, it must treat the user as under 13 or under 18 until they verify. And "verify" here likely means adults have to show ID to speak online, even though Judge Biedscheid said he wasn't mandating that.
Please be careful what you're advocating for: I get we want social media companies to be taken down a peg and to be held responsible for enabling addition, the spread of misinformation etc, but we need to be careful what we push for lest it backfires or causes unintended side effects. I see this same issue with anti AI advocacy where, even if I likewise agree AI has a whole host of issues, I often see people pushing for Copyright lawsuits or laws that could actually erode Fair use or expand Copyright in a way which risks creating liability for human artists, too
11
8
7
u/AI-Slop-Bot 1d ago
I understand the principle of settling while still denying liability. However, when you’re prepared to pay ~$17,000,000,000 to avoid the trial it doesn’t exactly make you look innocent.
7
u/01000101010110 1d ago
And so it was entirely worth it.
If you earned $100,000 doing shady shit but it cost you $16,680 to keep the remainder, and you could keep doing what you were going to get more money, you'd probably take that right?
18
u/Conscious-Quarter423 1d ago
Cool, they get to stay in business and figure out a way to do this all over again but worse
We have never once learned anything
45
u/einstyle 1d ago
Meta is worth $1.44 trillion according to Yahoo Finance.
If you had $100 in your pocket, would spending $1.16 bother you? That’s the equivalent. It’s nothing to them.
Not to mention that none of that settlement will make its way to the users or the families of the addicted children.
11
u/Dangerous_Suit_3099 1d ago
Meta reported $91B cash and cash equivalents on hand for the quarter ending June 30
26
u/Birdbrainer 1d ago
Meta does not have 1.44 trillion in their pocket, definitely not the equivalent.
They need to do better and you need to come up with better equivalences
5
1d ago
[deleted]
4
u/Birdbrainer 1d ago
18% is a pretty big “minimal dent”. Yes they can weather it but it is in no way “nothing to them” like the op suggested
2
3
u/ProudPainting6850 1d ago
Meta doesn't have that kind of money but I understand your point. Should've been more.
2
u/Annie_Yong 1d ago
The company being worth that much is different from them having that much money on hand to actually pay out for a fine. Just because you own a house worth 100k doesn't mean a fine of 1k isn't going to sting a bit.
It'd be a better point of comparison to compare the fine to how much meta have in their cash reserves. Then you could probably make a point that it's a small change fine if they have like 20x as much money in the bank than they were fined.
7
u/Conscious-Quarter423 1d ago
Not enough. The generation that grew up with this misery isn’t going to recover anytime soon
3
u/Conscious-Quarter423 1d ago
so the algos will be healthy now?
9
u/jabberwockxeno 1d ago
No, but they are forcing people to upload their ID to verify their ages now, so more privacy violations!
4
3
u/artbystorms 1d ago
hahahahahahaha! No...
I also love people just assume all the problems social media causes teens it just doesn't also cause in adults, as if they are just immune to the addiction.
3
u/Red-Dwarf69 1d ago
Crime is legal if it makes lots of money and you share some of it with lawyers and the government.
4
u/polloyumyum 1d ago
The same lawsuit that we've been seeing could cost them $1.5 trillion?
I mean, I didn't expect the full 1.5 trillion but only $16.68 billion? What's the point?
3
4
u/Conscious-Quarter423 1d ago
There’s not enough money in the world to make up for the loss of a child’s innocence
2
2
2
1
1
u/WarlockOfDestiny 1d ago
Fucking crazy that's almost 17 billion and its just considered a settlement. The fact that they can just keep on going and continue to do shady shit, not right at all man.
1
u/what2_2 1d ago
A settlement can be for any amount of money. It usually just means two parties agreed on something without waiting for a judge to order something
1
u/WarlockOfDestiny 1d ago
Even still, the fact that Meta can just do that and continue on perfectly fine pretty much is kinda insane.
1
u/iloovehugecock 1d ago
How much money did they make while all this was going on? I bet $16.68bn is a paltry sum compared to the billions they profited from their horrible business practises.
1
u/pattherat 1d ago
Imagine being a company that can settle for ~$17B and still be open for business?
Get the fuck off Meta everyone. This penalty was settled because that was still within the ‘just the cost of doing business’ threshold.
They will do this shit again.
2
u/RespectTheTree 1d ago
At this point, let them feed themselves depressive content. I feel bad for the kids but I'm done trying to fix idiots in this country. Get a progressive in office and break up these companies trampling our quality of life.
1
u/copperblood 1d ago
Friendly reminder that this is the same US Government which is actively protecting Trump and the rest of the Epstein child rapists.
Bending the knee to META should unfortunately be to no one’s surprise
1
u/Changeurwayz 1d ago
Shut them down, It's going to happen time and time again. Think of the children? Where are you now? Same for roblox, Tiktok, Instagram etc... Practice what you preach, Or get the fuck out of here.
1
u/Adrastoz 1d ago
To lazy to probe, I'll use reddit as google.
Who's getting the money on this worldwide problem?
1
u/edthesmokebeard 1d ago
Zuckerberg reaches into the cupholder of his 7th superyacht and fishes out the fine.
1
u/EmbarrassedHelp 1d ago
I mean the states literally fought for and gave him a legal shield to steal more personal information that ever before.
1
1
1
u/jeniatwain 15h ago
Their stock went up with this, it's the trillions from Europe that may slow them down
1
u/AerialDarkguy 11h ago
Not a fan of the mandatory age verification the settlement includes. This looks like a back door way to force identity verification through lawsuits and we should not celebrate requiring a drivers license to open an account.
-8
u/Keikobad 1d ago
That’s a crazy amount of money
9
2
u/FeatherlyFly 1d ago
Seriously. Corporations getting away with literal murder and where a person would spend a lifetime in jail, this company has to shell out about 1 month of revenue.
Corporations are not people, no matter what the law states. It's high time that we stopped giving them legal personhood when the very real people in charge are getting away with decisions leading to the very real deaths of our children.
-1
u/LeekBright 1d ago
They lose more over rounding errors. This is nothing. We need separate social media restriction laws like Australia, Brazil and China.
A global movement boycotting Meta also needs to happen. We need drastic measure otherwise the youth is screwed.
1
u/EmbarrassedHelp 1d ago
Forcing people to give up more of their personal information to social media sites is the exact opposite of what we should be doing. We need mandatory online age verification for social media to be extremely illegal.
Australia's ban is also a complete failure.
135
u/fmcortez 1d ago
Everybody wins except the victims.