The UK government expects Meta to give children in Britain the same protections the company agreed to in the United States on Wednesday, extending international pressure on the Instagram owner days after a settlement that could cost it up to $18bn (£13bn).
Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, said on Thursday that he did not want young people in the US to have “a higher rate of protection” than those in Britain. His comments moved the debate beyond American courtrooms and onto the question of whether the new safeguards will apply globally by default.
The US agreement ended a landmark lawsuit brought by California and 28 other states, which accused the company of deliberately designing addictive products that harmed young users and contributed to anxiety, depression and suicide. Meta denies wrongdoing as part of the settlement, which curtailed a major California trial.
At the center of the deal is a change in approach. Meta must make many of its safety limitations the default setting for teenage accounts, rather than requiring young users to opt in. The measures include daily usage limits and blocks on night-time use across the US, alterations already documented in the states’ case over Facebook and Instagram addiction.
For a British teenager, extending the framework would mean those same defaults arriving without any action on their part, closing the gap McFadden described between US and UK users. Whether Meta applies the changes voluntarily or under regulatory instruction is now the open question in London.
The settlement does not end Meta’s legal exposure. Alongside YouTube, TikTok and Snap, the company faces thousands of similar US lawsuits brought by families, individuals, school districts and other attorneys general, and it remains open to further regulation.
Meta is presenting the agreement as a template for rivals. Chief legal officer CJ Mahoney said that “because teens move fluidly across dozens of apps, we need an industry-wide solution,” calling on peers to adopt the same framework.
Not everyone is convinced the measures go far enough. Arturo Béjar, a former Facebook employee turned whistleblower, cautioned that the outcome “is not an all-clear to say the product is safe,” arguing the limits fall short of a genuine fix for how the apps affect young people.
British ministers are expected to press Meta on timing and scope for any UK rollout, testing whether a settlement negotiated in American courts becomes a global standard for how social media platforms treat their youngest users.