A New Mexico judge has ordered Meta to pay $25 billion, among the largest US corporate penalties. But the number in the headline is not the number that should worry Meta’s accountants. A 15% annual interest rate running until Meta pays means the meter now ticks at roughly $10 million a day, and Meta says it will appeal, a process that could take years.
According to Reuters, Judge Francis Mathew imposed the penalty on October 21 after a Santa Fe jury found Facebook misled consumers in a case arising from the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which a firm tied to Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign obtained data from as many as 87 million Facebook users without consent.
The $219 Billion Figure Behind the $25 Billion Order
The arithmetic behind the order is staggering. Jurors found on September 25 that 26 of 29 company and leadership statements were misleading, counting more than 43 million violations of New Mexico’s consumer protection laws, based on how many users or residents saw each statement. State law allows up to $5,000 per violation, which put the theoretical total above $219 billion.
Mathew found that a penalty above $219 billion was warranted, then cut it to $25 billion. The state had asked for $35 billion to $40 billion; Meta had urged a $3.45 billion cap, arguing a larger figure would scare businesses out of the state. As TechCrunch reported, the two-week trial examined the company’s handling of a third-party app linked to the breach, its data privacy policies, and its misinformation efforts.
“Facebook’s wrongdoing, over the course of years and systematically broadcast to the public, goes to the heart of Facebook’s core business practices,” Mathew wrote. The state also argued Meta knew third parties had broad data access and tolerated hate speech when it profited the company. All of the money goes to New Mexico’s school system, prompting Attorney General Raúl Torrez to quip the state may have paid for school construction for the next 100 years.
The Meter Runs While Meta Appeals
Meta says it will appeal. Chief legal officer C.J. Mahoney called the ruling “a tax on speech” that makes it “all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico,” adding the company is confident it will prevail.
That appeal is where the math turns brutal. The order carries 15% annual interest until Meta pays, about $3.75 billion a year or roughly $10.3 million a day. Torrez has said an appeal could take two to three years, adding roughly $7.5 billion to $11 billion before a higher court rules. Delay, usually a corporation’s best friend in litigation, is priced by the day here.
Why This Matters
Most coverage stops at the $25 billion figure, but that understates what happened in New Mexico this year. This was the state’s second jury verdict against Meta in six months: a March jury found Meta misled users about young users’ safety on Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, producing a $375 million penalty, and a judge later directed another $567 million into a teen mental health fund. Add Wednesday’s order, and one state of 2.1 million residents has now imposed nearly $26 billion on one company in one year.
Then there is the running Cambridge Analytica tab: $5 billion to the Federal Trade Commission in 2019, $725 million for a consumer class action in 2022, and $459 million this summer to resolve cases from 46 states and two territories. With New Mexico’s $25 billion, the scandal’s direct legal bill reaches roughly $31.2 billion, counting only checks written or ordered.
The deeper signal is what New Mexico’s lawyers stated openly in court: speak to Meta in the only language it understands, which is money. Other states settled; New Mexico opted out, went to trial twice, and won twice. Every state attorney general watching now has a template, and a price list, for doing the same. The question for Meta is no longer whether Cambridge Analytica keeps costing money, but how many states decide a trial pays better than a settlement.
Meanwhile in Tech News:
- ChatGPT’s Locked Chats Come With Privacy Fine Print Worth Reading
- Meta’s Ray-Ban Glasses Put a Camera on Your Face, and Privacy Groups Are Watching
