Meta has agreed to pay $2.2 billion to settle a federal lawsuit brought by a coalition of 29 state attorneys general, led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta. The tech giant was accused of deliberately designing Facebook and Instagram to be addictive for minors and illegally harvesting children’s data in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. The settlement was announced on August 26, just days after the trial began in the US District Court for the Northern District of California in Oakland. The coalition of states had originally sought damages that could have ballooned to roughly $200 billion. The Oakland trial was widely viewed as a bellwether that would set the tone for similar lawsuits against social media companies nationwide.
Source: Read the original article
