In 2018, according to Phonearena, 87 million Facebook users had their personal data stolen.
The data is believed to have been used by Russian-American researcher Aleksandr Kogan and eventually founded by the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica, a company co-founded by Steve Bannon, a consultant to former President Donald Trump.
Former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign is said to have used this user data to find out which regions of the US will react to the strong circulation of TV commercials.
The Guardian reported that Facebook's parent company, Meta, has settled a lawsuit by a Facebook user claiming that the company had illegally shared their personal data with Cambridge Analytica. The seriousness of this action was revealed when the FTC fined Facebook a whopping $5 billion.
A lawsuit filed in 2021 states that Facebook paid $4.9 billion, more than needed to the FTC, to ensure that co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg will not be named in the FTC lawsuit.
The terms of the agreement have not been disclosed, the lawsuit has been suspended for 60 days
The latest lawsuit brought by Meta was not a criminal lawsuit but a collective civil lawsuit, and the financial terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
No other details were disclosed, although it appears the plaintiffs are Facebook users with Cambridge Analytica personal data.
The company filed for bankrupt just two months after a breakout in the story of how it accessed the personal data of many Facebook users.
Although the amount Meta agreed to settle is unknown, legal experts believe Meta will have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars if the group loses the lawsuit. The San Francisco federal court's filing was requested a stay of 60 days.
Meanwhile, the plaintiff's lawyers and Meta's representatives issued a document discussing the terms of the settlement.
According to Guardian, the presentations provided by a former Cambridge Analytica employee show how former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign used data from Cambridge Analytica.
The class action lawsuit has been going on for 4 years and up to 87 million Facebook users are waiting to receive some compensation for Facebook's unauthorized use of their personal information.
