Meta ordered to pay $25bn to New Mexico in Cambridge Analytica data-privacy case

A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $25bn on Wednesday after a jury found it misled consumers in a case tied to Cambridge Analytica. Judge Francis Mathew said Facebook’s wrongdoing “goes to the heart” of its business practices. Meta did not immediately comment.

New Mexico’s attorney general sued in 2021 after Cambridge Analytica harvested data from up to 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app. The British political consulting firm was involved in Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. The state accused Meta of lying about data access, hate speech and misinformation.

On 25 September, a jury found 26 of 29 statements by Meta and its leadership misleading. It said Meta committed more than 43 million violations of New Mexico’s consumer laws. State law allows $5,000 per violation, with money going to schools. Mathew said $219bn was warranted but reduced it to $25bn.

The order came as Meta reported quarterly net income below expectations, dragged down by a $9.9bn settlement. In August it agreed to pay $17bn to settle a nationwide lawsuit by state attorneys general over allegedly addictive products that harmed children. Revenue still rose 26% to $64.6bn.

Meta urged a $3.45bn cap, saying a higher penalty could scare businesses away. It said New Mexico did not prove any consumer was misled and that it does not sell user data. Randi McGinn said the court should speak to Meta “in the only language it understands, which is money.”

It was the second Santa Fe jury verdict in six months against Meta. In March, a jury found Meta misled users about young users’ safety on Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp and ordered $375m in penalties. A judge later directed $567m into a New Mexico teen mental-health fund. Meta faces a wave of safety lawsuits, a “big tobacco moment” for social media.

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