Jefferson City, Mo (WGEM) – Riding off a win in the Meta settlement, Missouri plans to investigate more social media platforms for their impact on children’s mental health.
Missouri plans to investigate other social media platforms for their impact on children’s mental health following a settlement with Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, Attorney General Catherine Hanaway said.
As part of the settlement, Meta will implement time and content restrictions on Facebook and Instagram for users under 16 years of age, including:
• Daily time limits
• Restricting children’s access from 12:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m.
• Limited school-time access for children
• Robust age verification
• Safer, age-appropriate content controls
• Enhanced parental controls.
• Limits on social comparison features, including beauty filters and visible “like” counts
Missouri’s share of the more than $17 billion multistate settlement with Meta is $100 million. That amount will increase to $150 million if the state pursues similar legal action against other companies. Hanaway said the settlement money will go toward the state’s general revenue and consumer fraud funds.
Hanaway said her office is looking into other social media platforms, including TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube and Discord, as well as the gaming website Roblox.
“It is critically important that we do that because frankly most young people aren’t using Facebook and decreasingly they’re using Instagram,” Hanaway said. “They’re more likely to be on these other platforms and I’m sure these restrictions will drive them to the other platforms, so if we don’t do something there, I don’t know how much we will have improved things for kids.”
Meta Chief Legal Officer C.J. Mahoney said the company is calling on other platforms to adopt similar measures.
“Because teens move fluidly across dozens of apps, we need an industry-wide solution,” Mahoney said. “We therefore call on our industry peers, TikTok and YouTube, to implement this new framework, right away.”
Hanaway said the settlement follows other work by her office to protect children online. A Missouri law championed by Hanaway that requires users to verify their age before accessing websites with pornographic material takes effect Friday. The law requires websites with pornographic material to confirm users are 18 or older using government identification. Hanaway’s office can sue violating businesses for up to $10,000 a day if they do not comply.
“Obviously what we want to protect kids from is being exposed to these images ages where they are way too young to process it to handle it,” Hanaway said.
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