Facebook owner Meta has agreed to pay $725 million to settle charges over the use of customer data without permission. The settlement is the largest ever seen in a United States privacy case.
The class action suit was over a 2018 exposure of Facebook allowing Cambridge Analytica, a UK political consultant, to access significant data from up to 87 million users. Cambridge Analytica, which shut down in May 2018, reportedly used the data for voter profiling and targeting on behalf of assorted political campaigns in 2016.
The $725 million payout is the largest ever seen in a US data privacy case. It is also the most that Meta has paid to end a lawsuit.
“This historic settlement will provide meaningful relief to the class in this complex and novel privacy case,” said lead lawyers for the plaintiffs, Derek Loeser and Lesley Weaver, in a statement.
As usual, the settlement means Meta does not admit any wrongdoing. It is subject to the approval of a federal judge. Meta still faces a lawsuit from the attorney general for Washington, DC, plus investigations by state attorneys general.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission required Facebook to pay a $5 billion fine over the privacy scandal in July 2019.
The scandal involved a 2015 quiz app developed by Cambridge Analytica and Cambridge University researcher Aleksandr Kogan, which collected data not only about Facebook users who took the quiz, but also their connected friends on the social network, allowing CA to build voter profiles for approximately 71 million U.S. residents during the 2016 campaign.
The data collection came through an app called “This Is Your Digital Life,” which told Facebook users that the survey would be used for academic use.