Jason Slothouber (2L), senior prosecutor for the Colorado Attorney General's Office, leads a group of smiling prosecutors into the multi-state social media addiction trial against Meta on August 26, 2026, at the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building and United States Courthouse in Oakland, California. Meta agreed to pay US states as much as $16.7 billion and to impose sweeping new limits on how teenagers use Facebook and Instagram, according to a court filing on Wednesday that ends a landmark trial underway in California. The proposed settlement, filed in federal court, would resolve claims by a coalition of 29 US states that Meta deliberately engineered its platforms to hook young users, misled the public about the risks and unlawfully collected data from children under 13. (Photo by Karl Mondon / AFP via Getty Images)