Just last week on Aug. 26, the technology company Meta settled in a historic federal lawsuit brought by 47 states, as well as the Washington, D.C. and multiple U.S. territories. Not only is this the largest settlement pay out by a social media company in the United States to date, at $17.1 billion, but Meta has also agreed to implement restrictions on adolescent accounts. What the age verification process will look like is yet to be determined. The restrictions included limiting use of the app to two hours daily, hiding like counts from viewers and users and removing beauty filters. What differentiates this trial from many others that Meta and other social media giants have faced is the prosecution’s legal strategy and the prosecution’s ability to circumvent Section 230.
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 relieves social media companies, from Grindr to Google, of accountability in the event that their platform causes harm to users via misinformation, defamation or other issues regarding mental health.
The initial intention of Section 230’s authors, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) and former Representative Chris Cox (R-California) with the legislation was to protect freedom of speech on online forums following a series of defamation lawsuits.
Prior to Section 230, companies with “anything goes” policies, without moderators or claims of being “family friendly,” could not be held liable for anything published on their sites. Meanwhile,companies who attempted to filter offensive language or hate speech from their forums could be held responsible for what was published on their website. Prosecutors could argue that their filters were biased and that the companies should therefore be held liable for their users’ posts. From Wyden’s perspective, sites could either moderate their platforms but be held legally responsible for what was posted, or police nothing and avoid legal trouble altogether.
This legal distinction encouraged online companies to leave their websites completely unregulated to avoid lawsuits. So, in 1996, Wyden and Cox drafted Section 230 to encourage technology companies to implement “blocking and filtering technologies.”
Section 230 is largely responsible for the modern day social media landscape. It is incredibly controversial: Some consider it foundational in protecting free speech online in 2026; others argue it provides too much immunity to large technology corporations. For years, cases of stalking, mental health, extortion and blackmailing have gone to court only to be dismissed because of Section 230.
What changed? Why did Meta not only pay a historically large settlement but agree to place restrictions on arguably its most profitable audience: teenagers?
In this bellwether federal trial, prosecutors implemented a relatively new legal strategy. They argued that Meta was delivering a faulty product, lying to consumers about Facebook and Instagram’s addictive nature despite knowing of their harmful effects on mental health. Features like infinite scrolling, notifications and the infamous algorithm led to compulsive use and a myriad of health effects that come with addiction. The government’s tort law approach was more akin to the 1998 trial against four tobacco companies—who agreed to pay a $200 billion settlement and stop marketing to young audiences.
Meta tried to use Section 230 to protect themselves by arguing that mental health issues around body image and beauty filters—which will be turned off for teen accounts in the coming months—was a culture cultivated by users, not the application. In past cases, Meta has claimed to have no knowledge of their applications’ addictive natures or any proof of it.
Regarding the lawsuit, Madeleine Stone ’29 said, “ I’m slightly skeptical as to how efficient [the restrictions] are actually going to be, because I could see how it would be very easy to get around those age limits.”
It is hard to imagine these new regulations will be effective for a variety of reasons. If we stick to the “tobacco narrative,” it took more than a quarter of a century of anti-smoking activism and smear campaigns to reach the historic 1998 settlement. Even then, it’s estimated Americans smoke 170 billion cigarettes every year. Similarly, it is difficult to gauge how effective Meta’s age verification processes will be and if other social media companies will follow suit.
Of the new restrictions, Anya Drasin ’29 commented, “ It feels like Meta and the other social media companies started a fire, and now they’re trying to claim to be heroes by dumping one little bucket of water on it.”
According to this newest settlement and the people I spoke to, the fire is real. “ I look at my younger sister who’s 12 and has access to infinite scroll[ing] and short-form content. She’s so incredibly addicted,” Stone shared.
Like all things, social media has its positives and negatives. It connects people, facilitates the spreading of news and is responsible for disseminating information about social movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, among other things.
This is not to say dependency on social media is not real. I think we have all seen it. Even just this summer, my own screen time doubled because of my crippling Instagram addiction. But the experience inspired me to put restrictions on my phone—the only apps available to me from 10 p.m. to 12 a.m. are essentially Messages, Google Maps and Moodle. Even with those limits, I still find myself scrolling on my laptop. My dependency was not magically cured. That said, more and more people are blocking Reels from their Instagram pages, using applications like SociaLite or are just deleting Instagram altogether. Vassar campus even has its own Luddite club, for those who have gone cold turkey on smart phone usage.
While regulations might be slow to roll out and ineffective, we are beginning to treat screen addictions more seriously as a society. Though we have always heard abstract advice—“phones are bad for you,” “step away from the TV,” “go touch grass,”—federal rulings like this one might help push a more united national movement against social media and its harms.