Meta Investors, Mark Zuckerberg Reach Settlement To End $8 Billion Trial Over Facebook Privacy Litigation

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: Mark Zuckerberg and current and former directors and officers of Meta Platforms agreed on Thursday to settle claims seeking $8 billion for the damage they allegedly caused the company by allowing repeated violations of Facebook users' privacy, a lawyer for the shareholders told a Delaware judge on Thursday. The parties did not disclose details of the settlement and defense lawyers did not address the judge, Kathaleen McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery. McCormick adjourned the trial just as it was to enter its second day and she congratulated the parties. The plaintiffs' lawyer, Sam Closic, said the agreement just came together quickly.

Billionaire venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, who is a defendant in the trial and a Meta director, was scheduled to testify on Thursday. Shareholders of Meta sued Zuckerberg, Andreessen and other former company officials including former Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg in hopes of holding them liable for billions of dollars in fines and legal costs the company paid in recent years. The Federal Trade Commission fined Facebook $5 billion in 2019 after finding that it failed to comply with a 2012 agreement with the regulator to protect users' data. The shareholders wanted the 11 defendants to use their personal wealth to reimburse the company. The defendants denied the allegations, which they called "extreme claims." "This settlement may bring relief to the parties involved, but it's a missed opportunity for public accountability," said Jason Kint, the head of Digital Content Next, a trade group for content providers.

"Facebook has successfully remade the 'Cambridge Analytica' scandal about a few bad actors rather than an unraveling of its entire business model of surveillance capitalism and the reciprocal, unbridled sharing of personal data. That reckoning is now left unresolved."

Alternate title:

[Sebby]

"This settlement may bring relief to the parties involved, but it's a missed opportunity for public accountability"

Alternate title: Privacy Rapists Get Off Scot Free

Re:

[Moryath]

Nazi-run Facebook is banning people for posting links to the Holocaust Day Memorial Trust. The whole Meta monopolist crime syndicate needs to be ended.

Zuckerberg was going to have to testify

[rsilvergun]

The moment it came to that they immediately settled.

What about the money?

[UnresolvedExternal]

Where does this money end up? Do I get some?

Re:

[Sebby]

Where does this money end up? Do I get some?

[the parties settled], a lawyer for the shareholders told a Delaware judge on Thursday. The parties did not disclose details of the settlement and defense lawyers did not address the judge

In other words: the lawyer got the amount of money they wanted to get paid from the settelment, so fuck everybody else.

Re:

[edi_guy]

Pretty much every class-action lawsuit ever.

After reducing debt/balancing the budget (President / Congress FAIL)

I would think the next worthy target is tort reform, specifically in the area of class action lawsuits. if you get the same crappy OTA channels I do, then you see tons of lawyer ads for various class actions. Lotsa pharmaceuticals, army base stuff, and still...still asbestos after it ceased to be widely used after the 1970's and 1980s. It's just a cash grab for law firms....and the marketing pe

Re:

[Sebby]

Now with our AI friends doin most of the discovery that should be enough money for any firm

Until your case gets thrown out/dismissed with prejudice because your "lawyer" didn't do their fucking job.