Florida rejects $17 billion Meta settlement

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(The Center Square) – Florida has rejected joining the $17 billion Meta Platforms Inc. settlement, Attorney General James Uthmeier said Wednesday.

The agreement reached with 49 states, the District of Colombia and other territories calls for Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to pay out over $17 billion in annual installments over a 10-year period.

The money can be used to fund youth online safety initiatives and other state priorities, Meta said.

On Wednesday, Uthmeier announced Florida rejected the “weak payoff attempt.”

“Meta knows about the damage they caused, and we will hold them accountable in Florida,” said the attorney general, later adding: “The payouts are peanuts compared to the profound harms Meta’s profit-driven addictive features inflicted on kids, and a slap on the wrist for a trillion-dollar corp that’ll pay more to lawyers than to the states.”

The settlement came after the kick off of a federal trial where state attorneys general argued Meta had designed harmful features into its social media platforms causing severe mental and physical harm to minors.

Along with the payout, Meta agreed to new protections for teens including a default two-hour daily time limit, a default block from the apps between midnight and 6 a.m., muted notifications during school hours, the option to choose a non-algorithmic feed, ability to turn off autoplay, hiding likes on teen accounts, disabling cosmetic surgery and extreme makeup filters on teen accounts, protecting minors from unwanted contact from “suspicious adults,” and stronger parental controls, among other changes.

Meta said it would reduce the daily limit from two hours per app down to one hour if YouTube and TikTok agree to implement the changes as well.

In the meantime, states that are participating in the agreement will receive approximately 70% of the payout, which comes to about $12.7 billion.

The remaining $5.3 billion will only be paid out after YouTube and TikTok agree to implement certain safety changes like implementing a one-hour daily limit, blocking app use at night, and strengthening efforts to identify and remove underage accounts. Meta said YouTube and TikTok must also each pay an amount patching the final 30% payout.

“Trying to wipe out a decade of harm to the nation’s youth with one month’s cash flow is an insult,” Uthmeier said in response to the agreement. “Corporations like Meta will never learn a lesson if they don’t incur real costs for breaking the law.”