Meta, Roblox & Co Still Don’t Get Child Safety
Roblox is trying to tell the mother of a 13-year-old suicide victim her lawsuit should be tossed from the courts.
All because her daughter clicked “Agree” to the platform’s terms of use - at least 28 times, that is - when she was just eight years old.
Discord, YouTube, and TikTok are not far behind, filing motions of their own to argue similar cases.
And then there’s Meta, forced to overhaul its platforms and fork over nearly $18 billion this week in the name of child safety.
The Facebook and Instagram parent just settled allegations that it failed to adequately protect millions of children navigating social media for the first time in their lives.
For all Big Tech’s promises about protecting kids online, its recent actions are telling a different story - one that needs to be brought to the forefront.
When an Eight-Year-Old Clicks “Agree”
Audree Heine was just eight years old when she first accepted Roblox's terms of use.
Five years later, she died by suicide at 13. Audree’s family - and her personal journal - say she was exposed to child predators, violent ideologies, and harmful interactions across the social platforms she used.
The family has brought a wrongful death suit against Roblox and the others, and now the companies are fighting back, arguing Audree waived her rights to a public court case and agreed to private arbitration when she clicked “Yes.”
It seems Big Tech wants us to accept two ideas at once: that children are uniquely vulnerable online, and that a child's click on "Agree" should carry very adult legal consequences.
And it's not happening in isolation.
Meta gets an $18B Lesson in Child Safety
At almost the exact same time, Meta agreed to pay up to $18 billion to settle claims brought by 29 states accusing the company of designing Facebook and Instagram to addict kids despite knowing their algorithms caused mental harm.
Meta, of course, denies any wrongdoing. But as part of the settlement, it must now implement more than a dozen new protections for users under 18.
Here is the seemingly never-ending list:
• Two-hour daily limit across Facebook and Instagram; parental permission required to disable.
• Midnight - 6:00 a.m. block on major platform features.
• School Mode: notifications muted 8:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
• Usage prompts after 15, 60, 90 minutes.
• Non-algorithmic feed option parents can require.
• Teens or parents can disable autoplay.
• Like/reaction counts hidden by default.
• Cosmetic-surgery and extreme-makeup filters blocked.
• Stronger age checks for underage users.
• Age-appropriate content restrictions covering bullying, eating disorders, suicide, and self-harm.
• Private settings by default for teens.
• Stronger limits on suspicious adults contacting teens.
• Faster harmful-content reporting and response.
• Expanded parental controls and account alerts.
• Annual independent compliance audits for five years.
• Independent teen well-being research using consented data.
That's a lot of child protection for a company that has spent years insisting it was already working to keep young users safe, don't you think?
Maybe Protecting Kids Online isn't that Simple
The Zuckerberg company settlement also comes as governments around the world increasingly step in to do what platforms have struggled - or refused - to accomplish themselves.
It's easy to look at these cases and conclude that Big Tech has been paying lip service to child safety advocates and lawmakers for years - and it's about time US courts finally forced its hand.
But there's another reality: kids are extraordinarily good at getting around the rules adults create for them.
Take Australia, for example: even after Parliament banned children under the age of 16 from using social media, research found months later that 80% of them were still actively on it.
Before the ban? The number of under-16 social media users was just over 85%. A dismal difference of only 5 percentage points.
You can't Just Flip a Switch and Suddenly Make Children Safe
Maybe tech companies understand something regulators don't? That no matter how many rules are put in place, kids will be kids and find a way.
Meta itself makes that argument. The company says, “when teens are restricted on one app, they simply move to another.”
They argue that until other platforms, such as TikTok, adopt similar protections, it's a losing battle.
And they're not entirely wrong.
No age-verification system will stop every determined 12-year-old. No parental control will catch every predator. No two-hour timer will fix the complicated relationship between teenagers, technology, and mental health.
Governments can pass laws. Parents can install controls. Tech companies can build safeguards. And kids will inevitably find ways around some of them.
Still, it's not a free pass to do nothing - especially while teen users are still hurting themselves.
Maybe we need to start having adult conversations about what protecting kids online actually looks like - instead of pointing fingers in every direction, passing the buck to the next generation.
And more importantly, how do we make sure Big Tech becomes a real champion for child safety - and not just because another lawsuit forces them to?
Stefanie Schappert is a Senior Journalist at Cybernews covering cybersecurity, AI, national security, cyber policy, critical infrastructure, data privacy, and the human impact of technology. Based in New York, she is the first American journalist at Cybernews and a broadcast news veteran previously at Fox News, NY1 News, and Verizon FiOS 1. She holds a Master's degree in Cybersecurity and is ISC2 Certified in Cybersecurity (CC). A guest commentator on TV, radio, and podcasts, including CBS News, iHeartMedia, and KTLA, Schappert explores how technology and cyber risk shape society, from ransomware attacks and hacker groups to emerging technologies and digital policy. She has been published in Fortune and cited by the US Senate, FCC, HHS, Henry Jackson Society, academic institutions, and other leading technology publications.