Meta ordered to pay $25 billion in New Mexico case over Cambridge Analytica scandal

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A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $25 billion after the company was found to have misled users about its privacy practices in a case related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

The Wednesday ruling marks one of the largest-ever legal penalties for a tech giant — and just the latest court loss for Meta this year.

The company, then known as Facebook, disclosed in 2018 that the private information of as many as 87 million Facebook users was improperly obtained by political analytics firm Cambridge Analytica . The firm used that information to build profiles of American voters.

New Mexico sued Facebook in 2021, accusing it of mishandling state residents’ personal information and deceiving those users about its policies in connection with the incident.

A jury found in September that Meta had violated the state’s Unfair Practices Act more than 43 million times. State District Court Judge Francis Mathew criticized the company for what he described as a “coherent strategy designed to mislead the public” in his Wednesday penalty decision.

“Facebook’s misrepresentations about users’ control of their data were not isolated incidents, but rather a systematic pattern of deception at the core of Facebook’s business model,” Mathew wrote.

After Wednesday’s penalty decision, Meta said it will appeal the decision and has accused New Mexico’s attorney general of conflating privacy and speech issues.

“This ruling, and the Attorney General’s approach to this enforcement, makes it all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico,” Meta Chief Legal Officer C.J. Mahoney said in a statement. “At its core, this lawsuit seeks to impose a tax on speech to enforce new rules for what people can say online. We are confident we will prevail on appeal.”

Meta’s legal battles threaten to strain its business, though court penalties and settlements remain relatively small compared to the company’s earnings so far.

The company reported earnings for the quarter ended in September on Wednesday, including lower quarterly profits than Wall Street had expected. It attributed the miss to a charge from the $18 billion multistate settlement it agreed to in August to resolve claims that its platforms have addicted and harmed young people.

New Mexico was not a party to that settlement, which also resolved the participating states’ outstanding claims related to Cambridge Analytica.

Meta posted income from operations of nearly $13 billion during the quarter, compared to nearly $23 billion that it said it would have earned without the settlement.

Meta CFO Susan Li said on a call with analysts following the earnings report that the company is monitoring “active legal and regulatory matters that could significantly impact our business and financial results,” including additional youth-related trials set for later this year and next.

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新墨西哥州一名法官下令 Meta 公司支付 250 亿美元，此前该公司被认定在与剑桥分析公司丑闻相关的案件中，就其隐私做法误导了用户。

周三的裁决标志着科技巨头遭受了有史以来最大的法律处罚之一，也是 Meta 今年遭遇的最新一次法庭败诉。

该公司当时名为Facebook，于2018年披露，多达8700万Facebook用户的私人信息被政治分析公司剑桥分析公司不正当地获取。该公司利用这些信息构建了美国选民的画像。

2021 年，新墨西哥州起诉 Facebook，指控其不当处理该州居民的个人信息，并就该事件对其政策进行欺骗。

9月份，陪审团裁定Meta公司违反该州《不正当竞争法》超过4300万次。州地方法院法官弗朗西斯·马修在周三的处罚裁决中批评该公司采取了“旨在误导公众的连贯策略”。

“Facebook 对用户数据控制权的虚假陈述并非孤立事件，而是 Facebook 商业模式核心的系统性欺骗模式，”马修写道。

在周三的处罚决定公布后，Meta公司表示将对该决定提出上诉，并指责新墨西哥州总检察长混淆了隐私和言论自由问题。

Meta首席法务官CJ Mahoney在一份声明中表示：“这项裁决以及总检察长采取的执法方式，几乎让在新墨西哥州开展业务变得不可能。从本质上讲，这起诉讼试图对言论征税，以强制执行新的网络言论规则。我们有信心在上诉中胜诉。”

Meta的法律纠纷可能会给公司业务带来压力，但与公司迄今为止的收益相比，法院的罚款和和解金额仍然相对较小。

该公司周三公布了截至9月份的季度财报，季度利润低于华尔街预期。该公司将业绩不及预期归因于8月份达成的一项180亿美元的多州和解协议所产生的费用，该协议旨在解决其平台导致青少年上瘾和受到伤害的指控。

新墨西哥州并非该和解协议的参与方，该和解协议还解决了参与各州与剑桥分析公司相关的未决索赔。

Meta公司公布的季度营业收入接近130亿美元，而该公司表示，如果没有达成和解，其营业收入将接近230亿美元。

Meta 首席财务官 Susan Li 在财报发布后与分析师的电话会议上表示，公司正在密切关注“可能对我们的业务和财务业绩产生重大影响的活跃法律和监管事项”，包括今年晚些时候和明年将要进行的其他与青少年相关的审判。