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After a jury found Meta misled Facebook users about data privacy in connection with the Cambridge Analytica scandal, New Mexico's attorneys asked Judge Francis Mathew to impose penalties of $35 billion to $40 billion. The request follows a September 25 verdict in Santa Fe; Meta's lawyers argued the state's proposed sum is unconstitutional and urged a cap of $3.45 billion instead.
Following a late-September jury verdict finding Meta violated New Mexico's Unfair Practices Act with misleading privacy statements tied to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, state attorneys have asked a judge to impose penalties of $35 billion to $40 billion. The jury found 26 of 29 examined Meta statements misleading, translating into roughly 43 million consumer-law violations based on the New Mexico Facebook users who saw them. Meta is urging the court to cap penalties at $3.45 billion, arguing no residents were shown to have actually been misled, with a ruling expected later this month.
Meta VP Andy Stone rejected a journalist's claim, reported by Inc.'s Jason Aten, that its Muse AI agent accessed a user's private Messages without permission. Stone said the Messages integration in Muse for Mac is opt-in, requiring users to separately enable Full Disk Access and a Messages connector. Meta Superintelligence Labs executive David Singleton added that three layers of app- and macOS-level permissions must be explicitly granted before Muse can read messages.
A jury in State of New Mexico v. Facebook, Inc. found that Meta's Facebook violated the state's Unfair Practices Act more than 43 million times, tied to misleading statements about its data practices during the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Jurors determined Facebook misrepresented how it shared user data with third parties, profited from misinformation and hate speech while claiming to combat it, and made false statements about its internal Cambridge Analytica investigation. New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez announced the verdict, which could expose Meta to significant financial penalties.
A jury in New Mexico ruled that Meta violated the state's Unfair Practices Act, finding 26 of 29 examined statements about user data protections were misleading, amounting to more than 43 million violations based on affected users. The case, brought by the state attorney general in 2021, also concerned Meta's response to the 2013 Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which data from tens of millions of Facebook users was harvested via a personality-quiz app and used for targeted political ads in 2016.
A jury in Santa Fe ruled Facebook deceived users about privacy protections after a third-party quiz harvested data from roughly 87 million profiles and sold it to Cambridge Analytica. Jurors also found Facebook misled the public about subsequent investigations into data brokers, tallying more than 2 million violations affecting New Mexico's population. A judge will now decide penalties, with state attorneys seeking the maximum $5,000 per violation.
A New Mexico jury ruled that Meta violated the state's Unfair Practices Act, finding it misled residents about privacy protections and how it handled misinformation. The case stemmed from a 2021 lawsuit tied to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which Facebook user data was harvested and used for political ad targeting during the 2016 election. A judge has not yet determined the penalty Meta will face.
A widely circulated quote attributed to Mark Zuckerberg suggests he characterized Cambridge Analytica's data practices as nothing unusual, implying similar data harvesting was common industry practice rather than a unique violation. The remark, dated to 2017, has resurfaced without full context around the original scandal that saw millions of Facebook users' data improperly obtained.