Judge Bryan Biedscheid of New Mexico ordered Meta to implement new child safety measures on Facebook and Instagram, fining the company $567 million in a landmark ruling that compared the psychological harm from social media to pollution. The judge likened Meta's platforms to factories whose byproducts include mental health harms to young users.
The ruling, issued Thursday, marks the second phase of a trial in a lawsuit New Mexico filed against the social media giant. In addition to the financial penalty, Biedscheid ordered new safety measures including a time limit of 90 hours per month for users under 18, AI chatbot restrictions and mandatory warnings on the platforms. The order applies only to children in New Mexico, Meta has no deadline to implement the changes, and the company said it will appeal.
The $567 million fine comes after jurors ordered Meta to pay $375 million in March after determining the company knowingly harmed children's mental health and concealed what it knew about child sexual exploitation on its platforms. The combined penalties total $942 million.
Meta said in a statement that it works to keep people safe on its platforms and has been transparent about challenges of identifying and removing bad actors and harmful content. "We remain confident in our record of protecting teens online and will continue to defend ourselves against claims that misrepresent the facts," the company said.
What the Right Is Saying
Privacy advocates raised concerns about age-verification measures that many of the court's ordered changes require. Peter Ormerod, associate professor of law at Villanova University, said age verification "can be done well in a privacy-protective way, but it is not easy." Federal children's privacy laws prevent Meta from applying certain age-verification tools to children under 13 due to COPPA restrictions.
Neama Rahmani, former federal prosecutor and president of West Coast Trial Lawyers, said piecemeal state-level rulings could create problems. "It really needs to be uniform at the congressional level, it causes all sorts of problems," he said. "It just doesn't make sense in today's era of technology."
Critics also noted that features like autoplay, infinite scroll and algorithmic content recommendations were left untouched by the ruling. Biedscheid wrote that these features are used across the social media industry on other platforms, so restricting only Meta's features would harm the company competitively.
What the Left Is Saying
Child safety advocates praised the ruling as a significant step forward. Brooke Istook, president and chief strategy officer at the Heat Initiative advocacy organization, said she was glad to see the judge's reforms would be court-supervised. "Now, we will have someone in an official capacity checking the homework of these companies," she said. "The fact that we have the court now involved, they're able to evaluate how they're implemented, whether or not they're effective and whether or not they are actually working to keep kids safe online."
Sophia Choukas-Bradley, associate professor of psychology at the University of Pittsburgh, supported several measures in the ruling, particularly one that orders "like counts" on apps be hidden by default for minors' accounts. She also backs stronger separation between children and unconnected adults on platforms. "There are just too many documented cases of sextortion, sexploitation and sex trafficking that start in the online context for us to ignore this any longer," Choukas-Bradley said.
Some advocates said they hope similar rulings in other states could stir Congressional action and spur new efforts to pass federal legislation. Parents in New Mexico say the ruling could change conversations with their teens about social media use, though balancing safety with freedom remains a challenge.
What the Numbers Show
The total financial penalties against Meta from this case now stand at $942 million: $375 million in March plus $567 million from Thursday's ruling. The new order mandates a 90-hour monthly time limit for users under 18 on Facebook and Instagram. Jurors previously determined Meta knowingly concealed information about harms to children, including child sexual exploitation on its platforms.
Meta already has some safety tools in place, including Instagram Teen Accounts with built-in protections limiting who can contact teens and what content they can see. The company has not disclosed how many of its underage users currently use those features versus standard accounts.
The Bottom Line
The New Mexico ruling establishes a potential template for other court fights as Meta faces mounting legal, regulatory and public pressure over child safety. Implementation challenges remain significant: age verification requirements conflict with federal privacy law, identifying New Mexico users would rely on imperfect IP address checks, and the company has no deadline to comply.
Meta said it will appeal the ruling. The outcome of this case could influence similar litigation nationwide as courts in other states weigh how to hold social media companies accountable for harms to young users.