Kentucky AG says Meta settlement 'empowers parents' who struggle to limit social media's effects on their children

The settlement cut short what was expected to be a longer trial proceeding, pitting Kentucky, California, Colorado, and New Jersey against the tech company which owns Facebook and Instagram.

Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman has called the litigation over social media the "opioid fight of our time," vowing to pull back the curtain on Meta's inner workings and expose a system critics say intentionally deceived the public about addictive and harmful design features.

Among the changes Meta has agreed to: a "hard cap" on daily time limits and pauses for children using their two biggest platforms, disabling some "like" counts, the elimination of push notifications during weekday school hours, and stronger parental controls.

Coleman told Fox that last component is a big win.

"This is stuff that is empowering parents and that's the goal coming alongside parents. At the end of the day parents are ultimately the best defense or the last line of defense. But parents were at such a disadvantage fighting this technology," he said. "Our goal was to empower parents and that is what we achieved here today."

Kentucky Sen. Lindsey Tichenor wrote in a statement that the "daily limits, nighttime blocks, stronger age protections and improved parental controls included in this proposed settlement are meaningful steps in the right direction."

Yet skeptics, including some ex-Meta employees, argue the features are little more than window dressing. During testimony last week, a former Meta engineering director said the company routinely prioritized profits over safety, focusing on keeping usage numbers up even at the expense of users' mental well-being.

The four states never publicly stated their monetary goal in the proceedings, but Meta said it would amount to as much as $1.4 trillion, far more than the final figure in the settlement.