Meta Ordered to Pay $25 Billion for Deceiving Users on Privacy
A New Mexico judge has ordered Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, to pay $25 billion for deceiving users about its data privacy practices. The penalty, one of the largest levied against a tech giant, stems from a lawsuit filed by New Mexico in 2021 over a scandal involving the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.
The lawsuit claimed that Meta misled users with its public statements about their data privacy, and a jury in the State District Court in Santa Fe ruled against the company, finding 43 million violations of New Mexico's consumer protection laws. Each violation carried a penalty of up to $5,000.
Judge Francis J. Mathew of the State District Court in Santa Fe issued the landmark penalty, writing that the company and its executives purposefully misled the public. The order is the biggest blow yet to Meta, which has racked up court losses over the harms that its social media platforms have caused users.
New Mexico has been leading the charge against Meta, and winning. In August, a New Mexico judge ordered the company to pay $567 million in damages after a jury ruled the company had enabled harm to young users, on top of a $375 million penalty from the same case in March.
The penalty could inspire other states to pursue similar lawsuits, said Vincent Joralemon, the director of the Life Sciences Law and Policy Center at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology. "The takeaway from this will be that consumer protection laws will be the way to hold tech companies accountable," he said.
Meta has agreed to pay up to $17.1 billion in penalties and make major changes to its products over claims it endangered children with addictive social media platforms. The company will appeal the decision.
