Facebook’s parent company, Meta, has agreed to settle the Cambridge Analytica case for $725 million, according to a file from the U.S. District Court. The proposed settlement would resolve a lawsuit that has been open since 2018, when Facebook’s third-party consulting firm was accused of allowing access to the data of nearly 87 million users.
Cambridge Analytica, now a defunct company, had worked for Donald Trump’s successful presidential campaign in 2016. It captured the personal information of Facebook accounts to create voter profiles and target users without their consent.
The lawsuit has led governments around the world to reevaluate their privacy practices, and Facebook agreed to pay $5 billion to settle a Federal Trade Commission investigation in 2019 and then another $100 million to settle U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission claims.
The settlement has yet to be upheld by a federal judge from the San Francisco division of the Northern District of California court. Meta quoted by Reuters did not admit any guilt and “renewed its approach to privacy and implemented a comprehensive privacy program” He claimed.