“Meta settles major social media addiction lawsuit with school district”, 21 May 2026

Meta agreed to settle a major lawsuit on Thursday with a school district in Kentucky over claims that its social networks are designed to be addictive, leading to harm in children. The settlement comes less than three weeks before the case was scheduled to go to trial in federal court in California…

TikTok, Snap and YouTube settled their suits with Kentucky over the past couple of weeks.

“We’ve resolved this case amicably and remain focused on our longstanding work to build protections like Teen Accounts that help teens stay safe online, while giving parents simple controls to support their families,” said a Meta spokesperson. The company, which owns Facebook and Instagram, did not disclose the terms of the settlement.

A YouTube spokesperson also said the matter was resolved amicably and confidentially and that “for more than a decade, we’ve built YouTube responsibly – working with teachers, administrators, and parents’ groups to give students safer, more helpful experiences online”.

TikTok and Snap did not immediately return requests for comment…

The next two lawsuits against the social media companies are scheduled to go to trial in July. One was brought by an individual in California state court, the other by the attorney general of Tennessee in federal court. The next school district case is being brought by the Tucson unified school district in federal court in January 2027…