New Mexico jury finds 26 of Meta's 29 Facebook promises deceptive
Meta lost a second New Mexico consumer-protection jury trial this year, on findings the state's lawyer counts as 43.9 million violations worth up to $5,000 each. A judge sets the penalty next, and that same lawyer expects Meta's appeal to hold back any cash for four or five years.
The Investor · Invest desk
What happened
- For the second time this year, a New Mexico jury found Meta broke state consumer law, this time over promises to protect Facebook users from harmful content and data misuse.
- After two weeks of testimony in Santa Fe, jurors found 26 of the 29 Meta statements they weighed false or deceptive under the Unfair Practices Act.
- Jurors also found five unconscionable practices, including failing to tell users that a third-party app developer had accessed their data.
- State lead attorney Randi McGinn estimates 43,899,720 separate violations, each carrying a maximum penalty of $5,000.
- Judge Francis Mathew will set what Meta pays after hearings at which both sides argue the judgment.
Why it matters
- What it costs cost Each $100 per violation Judge Mathew assigns adds about $4.39 billion to what Meta owes, and each $1 adds about $43.9 million, so the rate he chooses decides whether this is a nuisance or a major charge.
- Who's exposed exposure Because the jury tied each statement to every Facebook user in the state, any other public pledge Meta made to New Mexicans can be multiplied into more than a million counts the same way.
- What it sets up precedent Two jury wins against Meta in one year give New Mexico's Department of Justice and its outside counsel a tested route for taking platform-promise claims all the way to a verdict.
Next story · Security · Oct 1
New Mexico asks for up to $40 billion after jury counts 43 million Meta violationsConfirmed4 publishers
McGinn's count [6] breaks down into 31 findings, the 26 deceptive statements plus the five unconscionable practices [16], each multiplied by 1,416,120 users [17]. That is slightly above the jury's floor of 1.4 million New Mexicans per statement [5]. At the Unfair Practices Act's maximum of $5,000 per violation [9], the total is $219.5 billion [18]. Spread across the state's Facebook users, it is $155,000 per person [20].
The $5,000 is a cap. Judge Mathew will hear argument from both sides before he fixes an amount [10].
The judgment can come in far below that cap in a few ways. Mathew could choose a rate near the bottom of the range. An appellate court could accept Meta's position, stated Friday, that "We have a First Amendment right to manage those platforms in a way we believe best serves the interests of our community" [7]. It could instead accept the argument from Meta's attorney, Dane Butswinkas, that the state's case rests on a data breach more than a decade old [13]. Or the award could survive and still arrive late. McGinn said Meta is almost certain to appeal, and "We aren't going to see the money for four or five years" [11].
In my view the counting unit matters more than the rate. The jury held that one statement reaches every Facebook user in the state [5]. Among the statements it found false was Mark Zuckerberg's May 2010 line in The Washington Post: "We do not and never will sell any of your information to anyone" [12]. An op-ed from 2010, counted against 2020 users, is how a single sentence becomes more than a million violations. The counter-case is that the per-user multiplication is the part an appeal would go after. Counted once per finding, 31 violations at $5,000 each top out at $155,000 [20].
McGinn was hired by the New Mexico Department of Justice to lead the case [15]. "My word to all the social media companies that would not be truthful to New Mexicans is like, 'Don't mess with New Mexico,'" she said [14]. Meta said it will continue "to defend ourselves against efforts to distort our record" [8]. That commits the company to years more litigation before any money changes hands [11]. Treating these promises as a liability priced per user stops making sense if Mathew, or an appellate court after him, throws out the per-user count.
What to watch
- Mathew's penalty hearings, where the state and Meta will argue over both the per-violation amount and how violations are counted.
- The grounds Meta cites when it appeals, and whether it contests the jury's finding that each statement reached at least 1.4 million users.
- Any penalty ruling from the earlier New Mexico jury verdict against Meta this year, the closest guide to how a court in the state prices these counts.
Information, not investment advice. This story is general information about companies and markets, drawn from cited reporting. It is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any security; check the cited sources before acting.
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- [1]
For the second time this year, a New Mexico jury found that Meta Platforms violated a state consumer protection law, in this case by making false promises to protect Facebook users from harmful content and data misuse.
- [2]
The verdict came Friday following two weeks of testimony in 1st Judicial District Court in Santa Fe before Judge Francis Mathew.
- [3]
Jurors weighed the truthfulness of 29 statements made by Meta under New Mexico's Unfair Practices Act and found 26 of them 'false or deceptive', on issues ranging from removal of hate speech and misinformation to users' ability to control their personal data.
- [4]
Jurors also found Meta responsible for five 'unconscionable' trade practices, including failure to notify users that their personal data was accessed by a third-party app developer and failure to remove hate speech and misinformation.
- [5]
Jurors found that each statement applied to at least 1.4 million New Mexicans, the estimated number of New Mexico Facebook users in 2020.
- [6]
Randi McGinn, New Mexico's lead attorney in the case, estimated the total number of separate violations at 43,899,720.
- [7]
"We have a First Amendment right to manage those platforms in a way we believe best serves the interests of our community."
- [8]
Meta said it will continue "to defend ourselves against efforts to distort our record."
- [9]
The Unfair Practices Act has a maximum penalty of $5,000 per violation.
- [10]
Judge Mathew will determine how much Meta must pay New Mexico and plans to hold hearings to allow the two sides to argue the potential judgment.
- [11]
McGinn said Meta is almost certain to appeal and that New Mexico is unlikely to be paid until the appeal is resolved: "We aren't going to see the money for four or five years."
- [12]
Among the statements jurors found false was one Mark Zuckerberg published in The Washington Post in May 2010, including: "We do not and never will sell any of your information to anyone."
- [13]
Meta's attorney, Dane Butswinkas, said in closing arguments that New Mexico's case is based on a data breach that occurred more than a decade ago.
- [14]
"My word to all the social media companies that would not be truthful to New Mexicans is like, 'Don't mess with New Mexico.'"
- [15]
McGinn was hired by the New Mexico Department of Justice as the state's lead attorney in the case.
- [16]
The jury's findings total 31: 26 false or deceptive statements plus five unconscionable practices.
- [17]
McGinn's 43,899,720 violations divide exactly by 31 findings into 1,416,120 users per finding.
- [18]
At the $5,000 maximum, 43,899,720 violations total about $219.5 billion.
- [19]
Each $100 per violation applied to 43,899,720 violations is about $4.39 billion; each $1 is about $43.9 million.
- [20]
At the $5,000 cap, 31 findings come to $155,000, equal to the ceiling per New Mexico Facebook user under per-user counting, or the whole ceiling if each finding counts once.
Sources
5 independent publishers whose own reporting we read for this story.
- New Mexico jury finds Meta violated consumer protection law
abqjournal.com
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- fortune.comNew Mexico jury finds Facebook liable for over 43 million violations of consumer protection law—and Meta could owe over $200 billion in penalties
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- livemint.comMeta misled users about Facebook data practices, New Mexico jury finds | Mint
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Topics and entities
Topics
- State attorney general enforcement against tech platforms
- Data privacy
- Consumer Protection Litigation
Entities
- Cambridge Analytica
- New Mexico Department of Justice
- New Mexico Unfair Practices Act
- Meta Platforms
- Mark Zuckerberg
- TikTok
- Raul Torrez