Meta Ordered to Pay $25 Billion Over Cambridge Analytica Data Privacy Violations

A New Mexico court filing released on Wednesday says Meta must pay $25 billion in fines for data privacy violations linked to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which a whistleblower made public in 2018. In September, a jury found Meta had broken the state's unfair practices law 43 million times. Each violation carried civil penalties of up to $5,000. The state was first awarded $220 billion, but District Court Judge Francis Mathew reduced the penalty to $25 billion. Meta will be charged 15% annual interest until the fine is paid.

The case relates to Facebook sharing the data of as many as 87 million users with Cambridge Analytica, a British political consulting firm. The firm used the data to build psychological profiles of voters for targeted advertising, including in the 2016 presidential election. New Mexico's case focused on what Facebook told consumers about its data practices, and how it handled misinformation and hate speech after the scandal emerged.

The judge described the scale, duration and willfulness of the violations as substantial aggravating circumstances. The filing says Facebook kept making public promises about user control of data and third-party misuse after staff and researchers had internally identified that it could not deliver on them. It also says Facebook did not follow through on the "comprehensive" probe it promised consumers. The court pointed to senior leadership, including Mark Zuckerberg and then-COO Sheryl Sandberg, as part of a strategy to mislead consumers.