Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul announced a multistate settlement Wednesday that will extract up to $17.1 billion from Meta over child safety claims — but Meta admits no wrongdoing, the platforms stay open, and the politicians get a press conference while the kids keep scrolling.
Forty-seven states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories joined the deal, which cuts short a federal trial in Oakland, California, where Instagram head Adam Mosseri had just begun testifying. Illinois stands to collect up to $768 million, according to Raoul's office. Utah gets $212 million, with a possible bump to $301 million if competitors follow suit.
The settlement resolves claims that Meta designed Facebook and Instagram with addictive features, exposed young users to mental health harms, and misled the public about the risks. The states also accused Meta of illegally collecting data on children under 13 without parental consent, violating federal law.
Raoul called it "a monumental victory for online safety that will affect an entire generation of young people." Meta framed it differently. The company said it was "building on our longstanding efforts to empower parents and support teens" and urged rivals like TikTok and YouTube to adopt similar measures.
Here is the fine print the attorneys general didn't spotlight at the podium. The guaranteed payout is roughly $12.7 billion over ten years, according to Scientific American. The remaining $5.3 billion only materializes if YouTube and TikTok agree to match Meta's terms — and match the payout. Meta's 2025 revenue was $201 billion. The $17 billion figure, while eye-catching, is a fraction of what the company earns in a single year. TMZ reported that Meta settled in part because the company said penalties in a lost trial could have exceeded $1 trillion.
The injunctive terms include a default two-hour daily time limit across Facebook and Instagram for users under 18, with mandatory pauses at 15, 60, and 90 minutes of continuous use. Nighttime blocks restrict content feeds from midnight to 6 a.m. Push notifications shut off during school hours on weekdays. Like counts will be hidden by default for teens. Beauty filters that mimic cosmetic surgery or alter skin tone get turned off. Age verification measures get stronger. An independent auditor monitors compliance for five years.
These are controls parents could impose themselves with existing phone settings. Instead, state attorneys general negotiated them on everyone's behalf, attached a billion-dollar price tag, and called it accountability.
The settlement follows a string of courtroom losses for Meta. In March, a New Mexico jury ordered the company to pay $375 million for misleading consumers about safety; the judge tacked on another $567 million earlier this month. A Los Angeles jury found Meta and Google liable for a woman's anxiety and depression, ordering $6 million in damages.
Meta denied all allegations in this case. The settlement is subject to court approval.
The question that lingers after the press releases are boxed up: if the platforms are as dangerous as the states claim, why is the remedy a check and some notification settings — and why are parents still the ones buying their kids the phones in the first place?
