Meta's $17.1B Settlement Brings Overdue Changes to Teen Accounts

Welcome to Parent Pixels, a parenting newsletter filled with practical advice, news, and resources to support you and your kids in the digital age. This week:

• We break down what’s changing in your child’s Instagram, following Meta’s $17.1B settlement.
• Is your teen buying products from fake influencers? 
• About half of Americans say they spend too much time on their smartphone, according to Pew Research.

Digital parenting

⚖️ Meta settles for $17.1B, agreeing to make sweeping changes for teens: Relatively soon after we published our last newsletter, news broke that Meta agreed to make major changes to its apps in a settlement that ended what would have been a lengthy lawsuit. Meta agreed to pay up to $17.1 billion to states (although $5 billion of the payout is contingent on Snap, TikTok, and YouTube also agreeing to settlements and product changes), and it will step up protections for teens on Instagram and Facebook. The changes include:

• A two-hour time limit for teen users (notable: this time limit doesn’t apply to messages, as pointed out by Jacqueline Nesi in Techno Sapiens)
• No overnight access
• Hidden likes and reactions for minors by default
• Blocked “extreme makeup filters” for teens
• Stronger age verification measures

Many of the safety features were already available if the user opted-in, but with these changes, they’ll be enabled by default on teen accounts. The updates will roll out over the next few months. 

However … this doesn’t mean that Instagram and Facebook are now totally safe for teens to use carte blanche. As Arturo Béjar, an ex-Facebook employee and whistleblower, said, “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.”

Parents still need to stay involved with what their kids do online, educate them about the risks, and monitor their activity. As Melanie Hempe writes on Be ScreenStrong, “A patched product is still a dangerous one.” And it doesn’t take very long to find headlines about platforms making big news about parental controls … only for those same parental controls to fail. (This happened when we tested ChatGPT’s safety notifications and Grok’s Kids Mode.) 

🛍️ Your child might be buying products from fake influencers: New research from Online Risk Labs shows that Temu, one of the most heavily advertised brands on Instagram and Facebook, spent up to $962 million on ads run through creator accounts — and most of its top creators are likely fake. 

These are polished-looking accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers, posting AI-generated videos of products with links to buy. Your child could watch an entire ad about beauty products and have no idea the person doesn’t exist. Kids are already more likely to trust influencer recommendations than traditional ads, and they’re less equipped than adults to spot the red flags of a fake account. An AI-generated creator is the perfect pathway to impulse purchases, comparison traps, and even scams.

Some parents aren’t aware of how easy it is to purchase products on social media platforms, so if your child has access to their own money, set limits on what they can purchase within apps (you can do that for free with Apple Screen Time), and talk to them about staying vigilant and critical when they see ads and sponsored content online. Just because a product sounds amazing, or someone looks persuasive, doesn’t mean it’s real or trustworthy. 

Tech talks

The Meta settlement is a good opening for a chat with your child about why these protections matter in the first place. Here are five ways in:

1. “Have you heard anything about the Meta trial? The company that makes Instagram and Facebook agreed to change how the product works for teens. Do you think that’s a good thing?”
2. “Instagram is going to limit teens to two hours a day by default. If you had to pick, when would you want to use Instagram?”
3. “A lot of the new safety settings only work if you’re actually using a teen account. Do you know why it’s important to use one?”
4. “Instagram is going to block access overnight for teens. Has being on your phone late at night ever affected how you feel the next day?”
5. “Do you think other social media apps should do what Instagram and Facebook are doing? Are there any other apps you feel like you use too much?”

What’s catching our eye

😬 Just over half (53%) of U.S. adults say they’re spending too much time on their smartphone. The percentage was highest among adults 18–29 (70%), followed by adults 30-49 (64%). 

📱 From October 2022 to March 2023, the FBI reported a 20% increase in sextortion cases involving minors. We spoke with Clayton Cranford, a leading child safety expert, former law enforcement officer, and founder of Cyber Safety Cop, to understand what parents need to know.

🌯 Something to share in the group chat: restaurants are using AI-generated menus and food pictures, and the results are … unsettling.

Related posts:

Meta Announces New Content Restrictions for Teens Teens See Mental Health as Their Top Challenge, Survey Says What Parents Should Know About Their Kids and Group Chats Online Safety Legislation Gains Supporters, But Future Is Still Uncertain