Parents May Welcome It... Meta Urges TikTok and YouTube to Join 'SNS Time Limits for Users Under 18'

Meta Launches All-Out Campaign with Full-Page Newspaper Ads

Meta, which recently reached a settlement with U.S. state governments regarding measures to prevent youth addiction to social networking services (SNS), is now pressuring its competitors.

On August 28 (local time), Meta ran full-page ads in major U.S. national newspapers such as the New York Times (NYT) and Los Angeles Times (LAT), publishing an open letter calling on TikTok and YouTube to join its efforts to protect young users. Meta introduced the algorithm changes agreed upon with state governments and urged competitors to participate in these measures as well. The algorithm changes include: ▲ Limiting users under 18 to a combined total of two hours per day on Facebook and Instagram ▲ Automatically disabling push notifications except for direct messages (DM) and account security/safety alerts during school hours, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. ▲ Restricting access to feeds, stories, explore, and reels—meaning no browsing or posting—from midnight to 6 a.m. ▲ Setting the main feed to the version without personalized recommendations by default ▲ Disabling autoplay ▲ Hiding the visible counts of reactions such as likes.

Meta emphasized, "We are working to ensure that young people benefit from new industry standards, but we cannot achieve this alone," adding, "Such protection measures are only effective when implemented in cooperation with competitors like TikTok and YouTube." Meta further argued, "Every platform needs to strengthen parental controls and support young people in this way, because if there are restrictions on just one app, teenagers will simply move on to another app."

It is being interpreted that Meta's latest advertisement is intended not only to capitalize on the advantage of being "the company that settled first" and strengthen its image as a service protecting young users, but also to prevent user migration to competitors. In fact, when Australia became the first country in the world to implement a complete ban on youth SNS usage late last year, smaller platforms such as ▲ Lemon8 ▲ Yoff ▲ Conversta—which were not among the 10 platforms targeted by the ban at the time—saw a rapid increase in popularity.

Previously, Meta agreed to pay a settlement of 16.7 billion dollars (approximately 23 trillion KRW) to defend itself in lawsuits with state governments. It also strengthened measures for youth protection. According to the settlement submitted to court, the settlement amount that Meta must pay state governments could reach up to 16.7 billion dollars, but one third of this settlement is conditional upon state governments reaching similar agreements with competing SNS platforms such as TikTok, YouTube, and Snap. It appears that Meta took this same position during the agreement process with state governments.

Meanwhile, Meta has not disclosed whether it will apply the measures required by the U.S. settlement to Korea. The Korea Communications Commission is currently reviewing options such as restricting SNS usage for children and teenagers under the age of 14, unless parental consent is granted, and limiting algorithm-based recommendations for teenagers.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.