New Mexico judge fines Meta $25bn over privacy deception

A judge in the US state of New Mexico has fined Meta, the parent company of Facebook, $25bn for deceiving users about its privacy practices. The case stemmed from the acquisition of personal data from Facebook in 2015 that was later used in the following year's presidential election. Meta is expected to appeal against the fine.

Alexander Alben, a former chief privacy officer for Washington state from 2015 to 2019 and a lecturer in artificial intelligence, internet law and privacy at UCLA, said the size of the penalty was surprising. He said it was the biggest privacy-related verdict ever in the United States. Meta faced a $5bn fine from the US Federal Trade Commission several years ago, but the new figure is much larger. Mr Alben said fines on this scale could change company behaviour.

He also said the New Mexico case is technically not a privacy case. It was brought under the state's unfair practices or unfair competition law. The fine followed a jury verdict, and Mr Alben said there may be grounds for appeal. He said the calculation of the $25bn figure may be the most vulnerable part. The judge found 44 million instances of deception, apparently by multiplying New Mexico's population by the number of deceptive acts. Mr Alben said that if history is a guide, the verdict is likely to be reduced on appeal.

The fine is not the only legal pressure on Meta. The company recently settled with 30 other states for $17bn over its social media practices and so-called addictive patterns on its platforms. Its most recent earnings report showed it paid nearly $10bn in fines in the last quarter for harm to young people, but the company still earned $64bn and its share price was still rising. Mr Alben said the United States has no national privacy law, so companies have not traditionally been held accountable for harms on social media, and individual states are now suing tech companies. The fine comes amid other cases, including one in Brazil this week.