‘Facebook’s wrongdoing’: Why has Meta been fined $25bn in New Mexico?

The tech giant has been accused of misleading users regarding Data privacy linked to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.A judge in New Mexico has ordered Meta Platforms to pay the US state $25bn after a court found the company intentionally misled consumers about the privacy of their data.“Facebook’s wrongdoing – over the course of years and systematically broadcast to the public – goes to ⁠the heart of Facebook’s core business practices,” Judge Francis Mathew wrote in his order, which came more than three weeks after the verdict.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1 of 3Saudi national charged with planting a listening device at OpenAI officeslist 2 of 3Mexico to force Meta, TikTok, and X to better protect minors on platformlist 3 of 3OpenAI bugging suspect allegedly booked one-way trip to Saudi Arabiaend of listThe judge found that a penalty of more than $219bn was warranted based on state law, but he reduced the figure to $25bn.New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez said it was one of the largest, if not the largest, single state verdict against ⁠a company in United States history.CJ Mahoney, Meta’s chief legal officer, said the company was confident it would win on appeal.“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,” 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.”What is the lawsuit about?New Mexico’s attorney general sued Meta in 2021 following revelations that Cambridge Analytica had harvested personal data from as many as 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app.Cambridge Analytica, a now-defunct British political consulting firm, harvested Facebook data to generate targeted political s during the 2016 election season, when it worked for Donald Trump’s successful presidential campaign.