Sign up for NPR's Up First morning newsletter for the stories you need to start your day.Meta has agreed to change the ways teens use its platforms and pay states up to $17.1 billion to settle claims its products are addictive and harmful to kids.It's the latest sign that long-running public frustration with tech companies is turning into concrete changes for the industry.2026 has already seen a wave of setbacks for social media giants.
In the spring, Meta lost two high-profile court cases over claims its products, including Instagram, harmed young users.The company and rival platforms including Google's YouTube, TikTok and Snapchat all settled similar lawsuits, though thousands more are pending.
This week, TikTok reached a separate $400 million settlement with the Justice Department over claims it illegally collected kids' data.Pressure is also growing from regulators and lawmakers around the world.A slew of U.S.
states have enacted restrictions on kids' social media use, while Australia last year became the first country to ban children under 16 from social media entirely, leading countries including Britain, Canada, Denmark, Indonesia and New Zealand to say they will follow suit.(In France, a law banning children under 15 from social media was blocked this month on constitutional grounds.)"There's clearly an enormous momentum shift here in the United States and globally in the public's assessment of social media platforms and the broader tech industry," said Jim Steyer, CEO of Common Sense Media, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization.Meta's settlement is among the largest ever struck by a U.S.
company.Critics are calling the recent run of legal defeats the tech industry's "Big Tobacco moment" — referring to the litigation campaign of the 1990s that forced tobacco companies to strike big settlements and changed how they marketed their products.The settlement announced this week with 47 states, the District of Columbia, and three U.S.
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