Meta's proposed $18B settlement in teen harm case throws YouTube and TikTok under the bus, too

Meta announced on Wednesday that it has offered to pay about $18 billion to settle the lawsuit against it brought by 52 attorneys general from US states, territories, and the District of Columbia. But part of that payout and some of its concessions are being conditioned on whether YouTube and TikTok will adopt its new teen- …

[just4this]

Yet for fuck knows why….

Their share price went up.

[IGotOut]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

Because it's a cop out. As stated, the payment spread out of a decade is no big loss to them. In addition, they are trying to limit the amount of restrictions forced upon them.

Throw in the "Admitting no fault", means it's harder for individuals or groups to sue them into oblivion.

[just4this]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

Seems they went up then straight back down.

Maybe they are still wide open for more payments to other countries.

It’s likely others will sue for the same in many other parts of the world.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

Actually, the settlement, while it does not admit liability, puts the emphasis onto the providers for the safeguards. This follows the tradition of strict liability in the US, which is why knives come with a warning that they are sharp, and coffee is served in cups with a warning that they may contain hot liquids.

However, the settlement also allows for a parent or guardian to overall the safeguards… which is what is going to happen for the most vulnerable.

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

Net profit last year was $60 billion. $18 billion over 10 years is 3%, which will be wiped out by what they predict AI will make them. Effectively, it'll be a rounding error.

[Mike 140]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

"For reference, Meta’s Q2 2026 revenue, reported at the end of July, was $60.8 billion."

Revenue is not profit.

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

Cool. Except I put the 2025 profit figure, which just happened to be the same as the Q2 2026 revenue.

[VoiceOfTruth]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

It is now just a cost item. No real damage.

[PhilipN]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

"The cheque's in the mail" Meta style.

[DS999]

Because it could have been a lot worse

Meta had recently announced they could face fines of $1.2 trillion if they lost in court. There was no way they would have actually ended up getting that big of a judgment against them, but Wall Street apparently thought this deal for less than they thought and/or just getting it settled and out the way made them happy.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Because it could have been a lot worse

$18bn “Cost of doing business”…. <in a Marlon Brando Godfather voice>.

[Persona]

Re: Because it could have been a lot worse

The probable 30% or so of that settlement that goes to the lawyers was clearly enough for them to agree to settle.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Yet for fuck knows why….

“Meta admitted no wrongdoing in the proposed settlement, naturally, though it’s still going to make considerable changes to ensure the not-risks it didn’t inflict on children won’t continue to cause them any nonexistent mental health harms on its pair of totally innocent social media platforms.”

It’s not even a decade on from Facebook - as it was - and Cambridge Analytic class action…”I do not recall”… Don’t ever forget.

https://www.theregister.com/offbeat/2022/08/29/facebook-settles-cambridge-analytica-class-action/563118

[Paul Herber]

"throws YouTube and TikTok under the bus"

Does Zuck know what a bus is?

Anyway, into Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B you go.

[Headley_Grange]

"Does Zuck know what a bus is?"

He doesn't recognize any vehicles that are significantly smaller than his yacht.

[stiine]

How can you use the internet these days without being able to identify motorcycles, busses, traffic lights, and crosswalks. Hell, its like we've been helping someone train its self-driving automobiles.

[Paul Herber]

In this country we are even helping the zebra crossings!

[CrazyOldCatMan]

In this country we are even helping the zebra crossings!

Zebras need help too!

[Groo The Wanderer - A Canuck]

No where near enough billions to stop the Asshole In Charge at ZuckerCorp from abusing everybody. Nail that ignorant little pissant for all he's worth - and all his tech-bro buddies, too!

[Alan Mackenzie]

Child abuse

If I were to abuse children, I'd be facing a substantial gaol sentence.

Yet Meta expects to get away with a barely noticeable slap-on-the-wrist fine, with no guilt presumed.

The USA: the best justice money can buy.

[Groo The Wanderer - A Canuck]

Re: Child abuse

Especially under Der Pumpkin Fuhrer. Just slip him 25% of the potential fine and all your problems go away - in unmarked bills, of course.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Child abuse

You're ignoring the prude filter that US (and to a lesser extent UK) justice applies to any wrongdoing: Meta, Coca-Cola, McDonads and many others are all causing demonstable harm to US children but as there's not sex involved, there's no problem. US media is filtered according to sex but not violence, which is why watching pornography is bad. Prostitution is also much more targeted than sexual abuse, even of children.

[Infused]

It Couldn't Have Happened to a Nicer Business

I doubt many people will feel any sympathy with Facebook & will think they got off lightly, but this does feel like state governments have found a way to circumvent the First Amendment & Section 230. I'm not so sure this is a victory for parents or teenagers.

[Headley_Grange]

Re: It Couldn't Have Happened to a Nicer Business

This isn't about free speech per se, it's about the equivalent of strapping you to a chair and having that free speech shouted at you for hours at a time with no escape.

[cookiecutter]

Re: It Couldn't Have Happened to a Nicer Business

nothing to do with free speech but meta ACTIVELY refusing to do anything to stop kids killing themselves because of its platforms. section 230 should have been struck down at least a decade ago. these are firms work $100s of billions & don't need legal protections so that they can facilitate sex blackmail & paedophillia

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: It Couldn't Have Happened to a Nicer Business

You know that the 1st amendment is meant for people, not companies, whatever the business-bought Supreme Court may say?

And that under section 230, Meta is a content publisher because of the algorithm that is showing filth to all users (including pornography), so it is fully responsible for the content publication?

[doublelayer]

Re: It Couldn't Have Happened to a Nicer Business

Section 230 was specifically written to allow sites to remove content (or reorder it) without being publishers. Your legal analysis is wrong. The current cases can't and have not overturned that. Instead, they focus on design attributes of the platform that you can legally blame Facebook for having installed. Many disagree with section 230 as written, but you won't fix that problem by pretending it says something else.

[Free treacle]

'member

When facebook and instagram weren't algorithm-driven? You got to the end of whatever your friends had shared and received the message "you're all caught up!". When we moved away from that I stopped using social media.

It's a shame only kids get access to this retro feature, and I read somewhere else that it was only going to be implemented for the startes named in the lawsuit. The concessions Meta are offering insinuate they know they are guilty as fuck while continuing to operate with exactly the same damaging practices in the majority of teen accounts.

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Key trial witness

whistleblower and ex-Facebook employee Arturo Béjar:

“The limitations that are in the agreement are the equivalent of saying: ‘Well you can smoke as many cigarettes as you can in two hours a day"

“It doesn’t make the cigarettes any safer.”

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/aug/26/meta-trial-witness-settlement

[Winkypop]

Major cop out

$250 billion or jail time.

No, scrap that.

$250 billion AND jail time.

A bunch of insidious assholes, all of them.

[ComputerSays_noAbsolutelyNo]

If this is agreed upon, we're screwed.

* A defendent makes demands to force behaviour upon third parties

* A defendent gets to choose a payment schedule for their fine

* A defendent gets to choose the corrective action

[Jedit]

"Meta said that it’s going to withhold 30 percent"

Indeed. Since when did companies have the power to declare what parts of a government judgement they were going to accept? The only correct response to this is "No, you're going to pay all of it, and now you're going to pay triple for trying to dictate terms to a nation-state."

[Charlie Clark]

Re: "Meta said that it’s going to withhold 30 percent"

Didn't you see the brown gold envelope that Zuck past to Trumpty Dumpty last year? The DoJ will do nothing and SCOTUS is generally in rubber stamp mode these days.

[doublelayer]

Re: "Meta said that it’s going to withhold 30 percent"

The important word is "settle". The governments can easily reject this. If they do, they have to go to court against a lot of Meta lawyers and win. Meta's suggestions aren't the part of a legal verdict they accept, they're proposals of what they'd be willing to do now. Right now, the governments concerned have no power to make any judgement at all since the court case hasn't been won.

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if they've written a sponsorship clause into that settlement? Any project paid for by that $18B has to contain the tag line: Financed by Facebook.

[may_i]

Justice?

So, it's alleged that Meta has caused harm to children. Their punishment is not to pay money to those harmed, it's to pay money to the government.

The USA is utterly lost.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Justice?

Given that the case was brought by the governments of the states, who else should get the money?

Civil suits are ongoing, as usual with American tort law, the alleged injuries are often eye-raising and the compensation demanded even more eye-watering. The agreement may initially hinder such cases because Fuckbook has not had to admit liability. However, the deal establish the principle that the service provider has a duty of care to minors. I expect the lawyers to make a packet. As they usually do.

America – the best justice money can buy™.

[teebie]

"If YouTube and TikTok agree to its terms, Meta will not only agree to keep those measures in place for 10 years"

Why would they do that? This is just a way for meta to pretend to offer something that they are not.

[Anonymous Coward]

More Theatre In The Courts And In The Press......

Link: https://www.theregister.com/public-sector/2026/06/29/australia-investigating-five-social-media-giants-for-not-enforcing-ban-on-kids/5263439

Quote: "... a study that found around 80 percent of kids in Australia continue to use social media despite the ban..."

Yup.....politicians and the courts SHOUTING that "We are doing something"........................

...........while doing most of nothing at all!

Sigh!

[Kurgan]

Do kids actually use Meta?

Being over 50 myself, I can see that no young person uses FB. Maybe someone in their 20+ still uses instagram, but there are almost no teens on anything Meta. Older people are all on FB, burning their brains over AI slop. So I ask myself, is it really a defeat for Meta if it can get itself AND TIKTOK banned from hooking up children?

Because as far as I can see, Meta is toast anyway, young people do not use it anymore. Meanwhile Tiktok is still hot for young people, and having it banned could be a nice idea for Zuck.

[luminous]

Re: Do kids actually use Meta?

You probably haven't been to South East Asia.....

Facebook has been FREE in the Philippines for decades (no data required). Average daily screen time is around 12 hours or something...mind blowing. Many businesses have a Facebook page instead of a website and nearly everyone uses marketplace to buy and sell.

Vietnam has rampant usage which particularly surprised me. Messenger is used in this part of the world more than WhatsApp.

I'd love them to go under... it would improve the world immensely but unfortunately I can't see it. Crimes near equivalent of war-crimes can be committed... and an expensive enough legal team will get you off.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Do kids actually use Meta?

I think for some teenagers Instagram is close to a religion with "influencers" generally peddling products such as skincare, dietary supplements and even cosmetic surgery that are definitely harmful to minors. Strangely, however, no-one seems to have mentioned this…

[doublelayer]

Re: Do kids actually use Meta?

Because if they did, the people making and selling the harmful products would be even more to blame for any harms they caused, and the influencers who specifically advertised them would be second, and the platform the influencers were on would be third. Those concerned about social media don't seem to care about either of the other two, so they haven't bothered to focus on that area.

[andy gibson]

How about parents actually parent?

"designing its platforms in such a way that it put young users at risk and drove excessive use."

So why aren't parents doing anything about the excessive use part of it?

Chocolate manufacturers make their products incredibly tasty and moreish.

If my child spent all their pocket money on Mars bars, I wouldn't expect the government to be forcing them to implement changes and safeguards to prevent it happening, I'd just stop their f**king pocket money.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

It's difficult when tehse things come pre-installed on devices, and then there are frequent updates and ads on the app stores that try to force them onto you if you haven't given in yet.

Children are notoriously bad at resisting popular pressure, both from peers, and from businesses deliberately targeting them.

[Strahd Ivarius]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

I just reinstalled a Windows 11 25h2 device from the ISO provided by MS, and I discovered WhatsApp installed and put as one of the first application listed in the menu...

Can we fine MS too?

[rasputinjones]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

WhatsApp is just a messaging app, not social media per se.

But I like the idea of fining MS regardless.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

It's like the browser wars, and Microsoft's big slapped wrists over that never happened.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

Largely, because in America there is the principle of unlimited liability which people routinely use to absolve themselves of any personal responsibility.

Occasionally suits do target egregious behaviour – it was discovered that McDonalds routinely ran billboard ads on hoardings close to schools in poorer areas and priced meal deals specifically with welfare recipients in mind. Even if children don't respond immediately to the advertisting, it normalises their expectations. Companies will settle for almost any amount of compensation but they'll do anything to avoid admitting liability, which is why the tobacco companies haven't been sued into the ground, despite ample evidence that they were aware of the risks to health their products posed from the late 1950s.

I'm not in favour of the nanny state, but the sugar industry should indeed be more heavily regulated. It has systematically created an environment of sweetness addiction in most of the world. It has abused medical research to do this, including the whole "calorie" debate and squashed reports that sugar substitutes can be as bad, sometimes worse because they confuse the body. But a simple measure would be to ban the placement of sweet products at the eye-level of children. Of course, supermarkets could this today if they wanted.

[Anonymous Crowbar]

Re: How about parents actually parent?

> Of course, supermarkets could this today if they wanted.

There is generally specific sweet free aisles in most supermarkets here in Ireland FYI. We also have a sugar tax on soft drinks since around 2019 [no idea if it worked or not though tbh]

[Anonymous Coward]

How can Meta impose conditions on a fine?

As useless as the usual "pay us some money and we won't talk about it any more" excuse for justice is in the US<,what baffles me most that Meta apparently has the ability to impose conditions on their settlement. Who the f*ck allowed that to even be uttered without an immediate contempt charge against the moron who tried this?

"Yes you caught us and we're going to pay you some lunch money divided over so many years that it'll be more a rounding error in our profits without admitting that there was anything wrong and we're only going to pay if Zuck can sleep with the judge's daughter". Or something like that. WTF?!?

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: How can Meta impose conditions on a fine?

It's a settlement to try to make the underlying issue go away. US justice: the finest money can buy.

[doublelayer]

Re: How can Meta impose conditions on a fine?

Because there is no fine until they lose in the case, and the case hasn't finished yet. Meta's making a proposal to pay this and end the case early. The governments on the other side can easily reject this and proceed through the rest of the case. If they do that and win, then Meta will not be able to adjust that fine, which will be the first actual fine involved. They can, however, appeal it for about ten years*, so there's a reason a lot of people settle cases to avoid that.

* No, taking away the ability to appeal is not a good idea. Meta can successfully keep appealing because there will be a lot of complicated parts in the judgement. In the case they lost earlier this year, for example, they were punished by the court telling them they have to make product changes. Since those changes weren't part of a previous contract the court was enforcing, that's probably not something a court can unilaterally order. Whether it is or not is one of the things they easily can appeal over since complicated law snags need to be sorted out.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Throws TikTok and Alphabet under the bus?

We're going to need a bigger bus.