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Cambridge Analytica scandal: Meta to pay $25 billion
It is the highest penalty ever imposed on the Facebook Group - and a warning signal to the tech companies. Meta announces appeal. more...
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ap | A court in the USA has imposed the highest fine ever on Facebook parent company Meta in the data protection scandal surrounding the analysis company Cambridge Analytica - $25 billion. “Facebook’s conduct was deliberate, and executives consistently misled users about how the platform worked,” District Judge Francis Mathew wrote in his ruling Wednesday. "Facebook promised users that they had control over their data. That was wrong." Meta announced an appeal against the verdict.
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez called it “one of the largest, if not the largest, state-level verdict against a company in American history.” The ruling should serve as a warning to other tech companies that New Mexico will continue to hold them accountable. “This ruling should be a signal, an unmistakable message, to Silicon Valley.”
Jurors concluded that Meta misled Facebook users about data protection and the handling of content. The lawsuit found Meta responsible for more than 43 million violations of consumer protection laws in New Mexico.
The background was the scandal surrounding the analysis company Cambridge Analytica, which used data from around 87 million Facebook profiles, which came from the results of a survey, for targeted political advertising for the 2016 US election.
New Mexico had sought a fine of between $35 billion and $40 billion, arguing that only such a large amount could bring about change at Facebook. Meta's lawyers, however, stated that the company would not pay more than 3.4 billion. A penalty of ten times or more would violate the principle of fair trial, would be unconstitutional and would not withstand appellate review, they said.
Meta argued that prosecutors in New Mexico failed to show that truly misleading privacy statements were made or that content moderation actually harmed New Mexicans.
According to the New Mexico Constitution, fines for violations of consumer protection laws go toward state education spending. “We may have financed the construction of schools for the next 100 years,” Torrez said. However, he admitted that the money would probably be tied up by Meta's appeal for the time being.
During an appeal, interest would accrue on the fine, but at the same time the number of violations Meta was accused of and thus the amount of the penalty could be reduced.