Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones announced intent to enforce new provisions of the Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act that limit minors' social media usage to one hour per day without parental consent. The law, effective January 1, 2026, requires age verification and verifiable parental consent to change time limits, with potential penalties up to $7,500 per violation and injunctive relief. This follows a motion to dismiss a lawsuit by NetChoice challenging the law.
Enforcement actions may result in civil penalties up to $7,500 per violation and injunctive relief to stop violating conduct, with a 30-day cure period before filing suit.
In-house legal teams should review all agreements involving minor users or their parents, including Terms of Service, Privacy Policies, Parental Consent Agreements, and any data processing addendums with social media platforms. Specific clauses to scrutinize are those governing age verification methods, enforcement of daily time limits (e.g., one-hour cap), processes for obtaining and managing verifiable parental consent to modify limits, and provisions related to usage monitoring and compliance reporting. Changes may be needed to implement robust age-screening technologies, integrate real-time time-tracking features, establish clear parental consent workflows with audit trails, and update penalty/indemnification clauses to reflect potential $7,500 per-violation liabilities and injunctive relief risks under the VCDPA.
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Social Media Platforms
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Social Media"social media platforms"
"Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act"
"limit a minor’s use of social media platform to one hour per day"
$353.0M
Attorney General Jay Jones announced a landmark $17 billion multistate settlement with Meta, with $353 million guaranteed for Virginia, resolving a child-safety lawsuit brought by a multistate coalition against the social media company. The settlement includes monetary relief and guardrails aimed at protecting children on Meta's platforms.
$353.0M
Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones announced a landmark $17 billion multistate settlement with Meta joined by 52 states and U.S. territories, resolving claims that Meta deceived the public about addictive design features harming youth mental health and shared Facebook users' private information with third parties before the 2016 election. Virginia is guaranteed $353 million (with an additional $11 million for the data-sharing claims, bringing its total to $364 million). Meta must implement sweeping child-safety reforms on Instagram and Facebook, including age verification, daily time limits, and 'check in breaks,' with implementation and efficacy regularly assessed by an independent auditor.
$2.0M
Attorney General Jones, along with four other states and the FTC, sued Zillow and Redfin for an illegal agreement where Zillow paid Redfin $100 million to exit the multifamily rental advertising market and exclusively display Zillow's listings. The settlement requires the companies to restore competition, pay $2 million, and prohibits future anticompetitive agreements.
Attorney General Jay Jones and a coalition of 21 attorneys general obtained a temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration from demanding a database of state-owned records containing sensitive personal information of 17 million commercial drivers from AAMVA. The lawsuits allege the federal agencies violated federal privacy laws and the Administrative Procedure Act by seeking to acquire the data without guardrails or public notice.
A coalition of 21 attorneys general and the Governor of Pennsylvania filed lawsuits against the U.S. Department of Transportation, FMCSA, DHS, and AAMVA to prevent the federal government from obtaining a database of personal information of 17 million commercial driver's license holders. The lawsuits allege the federal government violated federal privacy laws and the Administrative Procedure Act by demanding the data without notice or guardrails, and threatening to withhold $10 million in federal funding if AAMVA refused.
Attorney General Jay Jones announced the creation of the Regulated Products Enforcement Unit to centralize civil enforcement for liquid nicotine products, THC and hemp-derived products, kratom, and related intoxicants. The unit will oversee compliance, directory administration, and public education. It will coordinate with Virginia ABC and other agencies to take legal action against violators.