Meta has settled a lawsuit brought by 29 US states, agreeing to pay $18bn. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing The Guardian.

The US settlement

On Wednesday, Meta settled a lawsuit filed by 29 US states that argued the company designed addictive products that hooked young people. Under the settlement, Meta will pay $18bn and change certain features of its platform in the US. California's attorney general called it a victory that would make "a world of difference for children and their families."

As part of the settlement, Meta has agreed to set time limits on children's use of Facebook and Instagram and block nighttime usage.

A victory for Meta too

For Meta, the settlement is also a victory. Its share price rose after the deal was announced. CEO Mark Zuckerberg was not forced to testify. The sum to be paid, while not meaningless, is far less than the $200bn the states had sought or the $1.4tn Meta itself suggested in a court filing it might have to pay.

A mixed picture for the world

For the rest of the world, however, the picture is more mixed. The limits Meta will put on its US platform are largely similar to limits the UK and Australia have already achieved through regulation. Meta has made certain concessions that other governments could also demand: for example, while the UK plans to ban under-16s from social media, it may wish to ask Meta to impose a default daily use limit of two hours for under-18s, which is what the company has agreed to in the US.

These changes do not affect the case of Abrham Meareg. His case centers on Meta's algorithm. The algorithm is the system that decides what content to show users of Facebook and Instagram. It sees you linger over a video about knitting sweaters, for example, and then decides you'll like one about how to care for your spider plant.

It sees teenage girls watch diet content and shows them anorexia influencers. It sees young men search for bodybuilding content and shows them Andrew Tate. It is alleged to have amplified content that promoted the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya in Myanmar. It contributed to the election victory of Donald Trump.

Meareg's case

In October 2021, Abrham Meareg's father, a professor of chemistry in Ethiopia's northern town of Bahir Dar, was shot at close range and died outside his family home. This was in the middle of the country's civil war.

For weeks, Facebook's algorithm had actively promoted posts calling for the academic to be murdered, according to Meareg and Foxglove, a nonprofit organization supporting Meareg's lawsuit against the company in Kenya. These posts included photos of his father and his home address.

Meareg filed the lawsuit in 2022. He said he repeatedly asked Facebook to remove the posts and the company did nothing. Nearly four years later, the case has still not been heard. Foxglove said Meta had "fought tooth and nail to avoid responsibility."

Meareg said: "It's a matter of numbers to them, a matter of statistics. It has been proven multiple times that our lives do not matter to them."

Claims elsewhere

Elsewhere in the world, in jurisdictions as far flung as Amsterdam and Nairobi, other claims have yet to be heard. Far bigger questions about the power of a single US technology company to shape politics and democracy everywhere on Earth are still to be answered.

For the US, the settlement is a victory. However, since no changes to the algorithm were made, it is hard to see this changing the equation in war zones or creaking democracies. Arturo Béjar, a former Facebook employee and whistleblower, said the limitations were "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."

It may be up to groups and individuals elsewhere in the world to try to push for these larger changes. It will be an uphill struggle.