“We acknowledge no wrongdoing, but here’s $725 million.”
Meta proposed a settlement late Thursday to a 2018 lawsuit over elevations that now-defunct British political consulting outfit Cambridge Analytica improperly obtained access to user data from roughly 87 million people on the platform.
This suit is separate from then-Facebook’s $5 billion settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over the same matter.
The lawsuit settlement is subject to the approval of a federal judge in San Francisco, and a hearing is set for March 2.
Meta said in a statement that while it did not admit wrongdoing, the settlement was “in the best interest of our community and shareholders. Over the past three years, we revamped our approach to privacy and implemented a comprehensive privacy program.”
Lawyers for the plaintiffs said in the settlement filing that this marked the largest data privacy class-action lawsuit in U.S. history and the most Meta had ever paid to resolve a private class action, adding, “The amount of the recovery is particularly striking given that Facebook argued that its users consented to the practices at issue, and that the class suffered no actual damages.”
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