Newsletter
Meta has been ordered to pay $25 billion to New Mexico in a case stemming from the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The penalty follows a jury’s finding that the company misled Facebook users about how it protected their personal data and handled harmful content.
What happened: in 2018, Facebook disclosed that political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica had improperly obtained data belonging to as many as 87 million users.
The firm used it to build voter profiles and target political ads during the 2016 US election, when it worked for Donald Trump’s campaign.
The scandal raised questions about Facebook’s promises to protect users’ information. New Mexico’s case focused on those promises to its own residents.
In 2021, the state sued Facebook, alleging that it had misled users about who could access their data. The lawsuit also challenged its claims about tackling hate speech and misinformation, alleging that it tolerated harmful content when doing so benefited its business.
In September, a jury found Meta responsible for more than 43 million violations of the state’s consumer protection law. Wednesday’s ruling put a price on those violations: $25 billion.
Meta’s response: the company called the lawsuit “a tax on speech”, arguing that the ruling makes doing business in New Mexico almost impossible.
It accused the state of mixing privacy concerns with questions about what people can say online and said it expects to win on appeal.
Meanwhile, the earnings: Meta’s September-quarter revenue rose 26% to $64.6 billion, beating Wall Street’s expectations.
But legal costs took a substantial bite. Its September-quarter earnings included a $9.89 billion charge tied to an August settlement with US states over claims that its platforms harmed young people’s mental health.
The bigger picture: this adds to Meta’s growing legal bills over privacy and child safety. Earlier this year, New Mexico secured another $942 million in penalties in a separate case involving young users’ safety on Facebook and Instagram.
