mental health. As a result of this settlement, Wisconsin is set to receive
$219 million and we could receive up to $313 million if certain industry
conditions are met. Now the next step is determining where the funding is going
to be directed. What I'm going to be doing is everything I can to put these
funds for keeping kids safe in Wisconsin. Some potential examples of how these
funds could be used include crisis intervention services, after school
programming, digital wellness, youth mental health programming, supporting the
hiring of digital literacy counselors, and training for medical providers on
interactive media use and body dysmorphia. And then last they could also
go to grants for school district to support mental health. These numbers make
this the largest big tech settlement in the history of the country. It's also
the largest state consumer protection settlement ever aside from those in
involving big tobacco in a case where there's a single company that's
settling. From my perspective though, more important than the dollars we're
talking about are the sweeping new safety measures for kids that meta is
going to be required to implement as a direct result of this settlement
agreement. These changes are not only going to help reduce farms for kids
mental health online, but I hope they can set a new standard for the entire
industry so that kids who are using social media can stay safe and remain
healthy as they're online. We want to see this agreement prompt other companies
to make similar changes. Now the changes that meta is going to be required to
implement are groundbreaking and they go beyond anything previously ordered by
a court. As Attorney General Public Safety is my top priority and keeping
kids safe is of the utmost importance. The challenges that kids face today are
fundamentally different than the safety challenges that I faced as a kid. When I
was a kid, we would talk about people would talk about looking both ways before
you crossed the street. Now kids spend a lot of their time online. They are in a
digital world and making sure that we are taking actions to keep kids safe is
fundamental to what we do at the OJ to protect public safety and is at the
root of this agreement. So today it takes a concerted effort from kids but also
their parents and their family members from schools and from communities to
prioritize real-world interactions and learning. And it takes just as robust an
effort to protect kids from the threats that they face online. Threats that range
from exploitation to extortion to addiction and isolation as well as
mental health harms from addiction to social media. The world is changing
rapidly and it's part of Wisconsin DOJ's mission to meet this moment by
combating the new threats that social media poses to our kids mental health
and to take those challenges head-on. That's why I had a coalition of HEs from
other states sued medical platforms in October 2023 following our multi-state
investigation. In our lawsuit we alleged that the company knowingly designed and
employed harmful features on Instagram and other social media platforms that
purposely addict children and teens. We've also alleged that
meta falsely assured the public that these features are safe and suitable for
young users. Instead of taking steps to address those harms we alleged that
meta concealed the extent of the psychological and health harms suffered
by young users addicted to its platforms. Beyond this the company is alleged to
have known that young users some under the age of 13 were active on the
platforms and knowingly collected data from those users without parental consent.
In addition to those allegations our suit alleged that meta targeted these
young users and described that such a user base was quote valuable but untapped
unquote. Well this settlement resolves those claims as well as other claims by
other settling states and territories. So today as part of this settlement with
Wisconsin and a coalition meta has agreed to implement significant new
kids safety features on Instagram and Facebook. As I said before these are
some transformative features that are in place. For those who are under 13 they
are not supposed to be on these platforms and they're going to be stronger age
verification measures in place. For those between the ages of 13 from ages of
13 to 17. This agreement will create a combined two hour daily limit for both
Facebook and Instagram in total. There will be mandatory pauses at 15 minutes 60
minutes and 90 minutes. The goal of that is to help interrupt what my kids would
refer to as doom scrolling online. There are also restrictions on nighttime
access. Those will limit the hours when these platforms are available to kids.
There are going to be limits on school time access as well. Specifically there's
going to be an elimination of push notifications during school hours. As I
mentioned there are going to be more robust age assurance measures and they're
going to be safer age appropriate content controls in place. Including
stronger safeguards against bullying, content promoting eating disorders and
content related to suicide and self harm. They're going to be stronger more
friendly user friendly parental controls in place as well. So parents are going to
be able more easily to play a larger role in limiting their kids use of these
platforms. And there are going to be limits on social comparison features including
certain beauty filter filters and visible light counts that have been linked to
poor mental health outcomes in kids and teens. Now these are groundbreaking new
changes that are geared toward making social media safer for kids and
providing parents with stronger tools to be involved in their kids online lives.
There's no doubt that that this settlement is historic but it's also my
sincere hope that this is an inflection point where after these changes go into
effect and after today's settlement agreement has now been announced other
big tech firms and social media companies beyond meta will hear our message that
we are committed to getting accountability from social media companies
that engage in conduct that farms our kids and now is the time for them to
make the kind of sweeping changes in the name of kids safety online. These
changes will be implemented over a period of time. Most of the changes will go into
effect within six months of the judgment and there will be some changes soon as
two months from the entry of the judgment. This is a fundamental change in the way
that kids are going to social media will play a role in kids lives at least with
respect to Instagram and Facebook and we are committed to ensuring that we are
doing what we can to keep our kids safe from these online arms. So with that I'll
take any questions that folks may have.
All right everyone a little bit of housekeeping so we're now going to take on
topic questions for media members. If you have a question please raise your hand
and we will call on you in the order in which you ask your question. Once we call
on you we will promote you to panelists that you may speak this might take a
second. As a reminder if you're on your phone you can press star nine to raise
or lower your hand and star six to mute or unmute yourself once you're
called on. We will begin momentarily.
Mitchell Smith.
Yeah yeah thank you very much for the for the time today. You had mentioned early on
that Wisconsin is set to receive I think you I believe you said it was 219 million
or up to 313 million instead of if certain industry conditions are met would you
be possible to kind of expand on that a little bit and then if there'd be any
sort of info on the timing for these funds.
Yeah there are a couple aspects of the settlement that will be strengthened if
there are other agreements reached or other conditions imposed on other
social media companies. So first with respect to some of the limits that I
talked about for the limits for example on nighttime hour usage as well as the
time limits per day. If TikTok, Snapchat, and YouTube are subject to similar
limits then they will apply even stronger here. In terms of the
settlement amounts if we receive resolutions of a certain amount from
TikTok as well as YouTube then that would lead to the
four amount being recovered as part of the settlement we can get to the
precise numbers on what those those are required to be but there's a lot
there's some nuance to it because if we as a state receiver proportion of the
total amount that would trigger the the obligations that Meta has towards
Wisconsin or if nationwide there's a certain amount that could also trigger
the applications.
All right next up is Vanessa.
Hi thank you. Where does the suit stand in terms of the other apps you
mentioned like a TikTok or Snapchat? If all these restrictions are just being
put in place for Instagram and Facebook I could imagine that would drive kids
just to use those other apps more so what's next for these other platforms?
Yeah there are a couple things I would say so first
we were part of a multi-state investigation into social media use
generally it was not specific to Meta platforms and so
companies are well aware that we're not just looking at Meta platforms right
now we're looking at the landscape of social media companies.
Companies that step in and try to take advantage of the fact that
Meta is putting in place these requirements that they've been obligated to
should be clear then that they are on notice that
they are going to be held accountable for the conduct they're engaging in.
This is a massive settlement amount with Meta here
but the types of settlement amounts the types of recoveries we could be
seeking from others if they engage in conduct that tries to take advantage
of this situation could be very well very significant.
So we are committed to seeing not just change on one platform not just on
Instagram we're not just on Meta platforms but throughout the social
media industry.
Then Hanson?
Hi thank you very much. What kind of damage were you seeing with
children at a local state level here in Wisconsin that made you
want to join this effort? Well first I think anybody who has kids
knows the draw and the allure of these social media platforms
and you know as kids get into their teenage years and are of the age where
they're able to use these platforms there have been lots of harms that have
been documented but one certainly concerning aspect is the
addictive nature of these platforms and the fact that
kids can use lots and lots of time on them. Another concern is the mental
health harms that occur from some of these comparison
features. Kids for example seeing beauty filters online and
trying to compare themselves to somebody else's filtered image or
seeing the the light counts that somebody else
racks up on Instagram and somehow feeling like that's a judgment of
their social status and then on top of that there are conversations about
concerning topics which is why some of the content restrictions here are so
important things like bullying that's happening or
conversations about self-harm or eating disorders.
So there are widespread harms that we've alleged are linked to these social
media platforms and to the addiction of it. We've alleged that these
companies that met us specifically knew about these harms
and yet continued to do what it was doing. So this kind of massive
settlement amount as well as these kind of
game-changing changes in how these platforms do their business with respect
to kids who are online is going to fundamentally change the way that
that social media, the role that social media plays in kids lives.
Again this is not the complete industry but it's a critical part of it.
Jesse.
Thank you. Could you just expand a little bit more on the allocation of these funds
once the state has them and is this a situation where DOJ has full
discretion over what to do with them or do you need to work with the
legislature on this? Yeah, no. DOJ will be
assessing the precise allocation of these funds. The vast majority
will be going toward addressing mental health harms for kids
in Wisconsin. The settlement agreement provides for
50% of the overall settlement minimum going towards
addressing the types of harms that have caused and there are a number of different
examples of the types of programs that that may benefit from these settlement
funds that includes things like grants to school districts,
youth mental health programming, after school programming.
So what we're going to be doing in the weeks ahead is assessing how we can
use these funds most effectively to help kids.
Of course it's also important that we continue to be able to do this work and
that that work is funded so that we are continuing to hold the industry
accountable for the kind of conduct that we've alleged is
fine.
This is the last call for questions. If anyone has a question please raise your
hand and we will call on you.
Scott?
Yeah, thanks. I just wanted to re-ask Jesse's question. So DOJ has
full discretion on how this money is spent.
Well we're subject to the conditions of the settlement agreement. So the
settlement agreement lays out how the funds can be utilized.
As a practical matter the majority of the funds here from the settlement
will be going towards various programs that support
youth mental health and things along the lines that I talked about.
We will be in contact with stakeholders and others
about how we can use those funds most effectively to ensure that they're
serving the purpose that they're designed to which is
remediating the harm and helping with the kids mental health coming forward.
Great that concludes today's press conference. Thank you all for joining.
If you have any further questions don't hesitate to reach out to the DOJ
communications office. We are at dojcommunications.doj.state.wi.us.
Thank you. Thanks everyone.