BRUSSELS — The United States just made Meta change how it treats kids. The pressure's now on for Europe to prove its tougher tech laws can do the same — or go even further.
Forty-seven U.S. states settled a landmark lawsuit with Meta for $18 billion on Wednesday, agreeing with the tech giant to set guardrails on its addictive design to better protect teenagers from harm. It is the culmination of a yearslong battle in one of the largest consumer protection settlements in U.S. history.
From Brussels’ vantage point, it’s both a win for online safety and a loss of face for the European regulator, which has tried to get the social media giant to change its ways for years.
The settlement on Wednesday details a series of changes that Meta needs to make to Facebook and Instagram over the next 10 years, including limiting daily time for minors on the platform, checking ages of users more rigorously and disabling cosmetic filters for teens.
It has upped the ante for Brussels’ social media regulators.
“Ironically, 9 measures out of 12 are covered by the [Digital Services Act], our law since 2023. U.S. courts are going faster than the EU Commission. We must ENFORCE DSA NOW!” former European Commissioner Thierry Breton, who negotiated and enforced the EU's social media rulebook up to 2024, wrote on X after the news of the settlement.
German center-right lawmaker Andreas Schwab told POLITICO that Meta in the U.S. now "has even to go beyond what it offers to the European consumers." Schwab, an architect of one of the EU’s Big Tech laws, the Digital Markets Act, called for Meta's policies in the two jurisdictions to be aligned.
The European Commission in July accused Meta of breaching EU rules under the Digital Services Act by running addictive design features on Facebook and Instagram. In April, it accused Meta of breaking the same rules for not doing enough to keep under-13s off its platforms. The EU's investigation into addictive design and minors is more than two years old but has yet to yield concessions from the company or penalties for non-compliance.
Spanish center-left European Parliament lawmaker Laura Ballarín Cereza asked the Commission on Thursday why Meta has committed to making changes only for U.S. users while it is in a discussion with EU authorities over the same issues. How will the Commission “ensure that EU citizens are not left with weaker protections than those in the US,” she wrote.
Thomas Regnier, spokesperson for digital policy at the European Commission, said in a statement that it “is in continuous dialogue with Meta, who still has the possibility to offer commitments in the EU.”
Meta has said it disagrees with the Commission's April and July findings. If it doesn't make changes to the EU's satisfaction, the firm risks facing a fine of up to 6 percent of its annual global revenue, which would amount to a maximum of $12 billion. Even if the full fine is imposed, which is highly unlikely, it's well under the $18 billion it settled for in the U.S.
Europe wants more
However, the changes Meta has pledged to make in the U.S. may not be as far-reaching as they seem — or meet the EU executive's demands.
The Commission wants Meta to change, or at least offer users by default, a way out of the core addictive design features of its platforms — such as autoplay, infinite scroll and highly personalized feeds. The EU also demands remedies that limit time spent on the app and has previously dismissed Meta's time management and parental controls as not good enough.
The settlement's proposed changes are "business as usual," Jessica Galissaire, senior policy researcher at think tank Interface, told POLITICO about the EU's investigation. The Commission is asking for more far-reaching changes to the addictive design of the service, rather than just curtailing access to it, she said.
“The platforms are starting to be scared of litigations," said Galissare. "It’s some steps in the in the right direction" but "we shouldn't settle for the lightweight changes that Meta is suggesting."
The settlement focuses on limiting access to the app at certain times as a default setting, and in many of these areas, teens or parents will be able to switch from these settings to less restrictive ones. Senior Commission officials have previously criticized Meta's parental controls for their complexity.
But Meta will only give users the option to turn off the features most closely associated with engagement maximization, like autoplay and personalized feeds, instead of making them the default for every child, said Francesca Pisanu, senior policy officer at child rights group Eurochild.
“The U.S. settlement establishes a combination of strong defaults, usage restrictions and parental controls, while the Commission’s preliminary approach more explicitly challenges the underlying engagement-maximising architecture of the platforms themselves,” said Pisanu.
Leanda Barrington-Leach, executive director at the child rights group 5Rights Foundation, said: "Changes which focus on limiting children's access will not prevent continued exploitation and harm to children."
For now, Meta has held back from committing to roll out the changes it will make in the U.S. to users worldwide. It has said it will monitor how these changes are working in the U.S. and continue to engage with other governments. That's despite officials' explicit requests to do so in the U.K., South Korea and elsewhere.
On Wednesday night, the U.K.’s Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Pat McFadden, told Sky News he expected Meta to extend the changes to the U.K., saying the government didn’t want “a situation where young people in America have got a higher rate of protection than young people in the U.K.”
