New Mexico Judge Orders Meta to Pay $25 Billion in Privacy Case

Key Facts

A judge in the U.S. state of New Mexico ordered Meta to pay $25 billion in a case over misleading consumers about data privacy, Reuters reported, citing the ruling issued on October 21, 2026. The court order followed a jury finding 43,899,725 deliberate violations of state law. The jury issued its verdict on September 25, before the judge set the penalty the following month. This sequence separates the jury’s decision on liability and the number of violations from the judge’s determination of the amount to be paid. Meta said it would appeal the ruling, meaning the order does not represent immediate collection of the money.

The ruling records 43,899,720 violations involving unfair or deceptive practices, plus 5 violations of practices the ruling described as exploitative, for a total of 43,899,725 deliberate violations. The jury considered 29 statements made by the company and its executives and found that 26 were misleading, Reuters reported. The court said the 26 statements the jury deemed unlawful and deliberate spanned more than 11 years, from May 24, 2010, to August 18, 2021. The ruling thus links the jury’s findings to practices and statements over an extended period. The case centers on allegations about how Facebook handled user data and what the company said about its practices, according to the New Mexico Department of Justice.

Reuters reported that state law allows a penalty of up to $5,000 for each violation and directs collected funds to New Mexico’s school system. But the judge set the amount at $25 billion, after the number of violations had been a central issue in the ruling. At the penalty hearing, Meta said the state had not established that misleading statements were made or that harm occurred, and that a judgment far exceeding $3.4 billion would be unconstitutional, according to the Associated Press. The dispute shows the scale of the gap between the company’s position on the penalty ceiling and the amount ordered by the judge. It also makes the appeal process a decisive factor in whether the ruling stands.

The case dates back to Facebook’s conduct connected to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, while the trial addressed the company’s statements about data practices and its handling of misinformation and hate speech, according to the New Mexico Department of Justice. The $25 billion ruling, however, concerns privacy and misleading consumers, not the separate child safety case. A previous child safety trial in the state ended in March 2026 with a separate order requiring Meta to pay $375 million in civil penalties, Reuters reported. The company also disclosed a separate settlement with California, reached in December 2025 and approved by a court in March 2026. Another federal penalty stemmed from a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission; Meta said it paid $5 billion in April 2020.

Meta Chief Legal Officer C.J. Mahoney said the company was “confident it will prevail on appeal” and described the lawsuit as seeking to impose a tax on speech, according to the Associated Press. Reuters cited legal experts who said the appeal could challenge the counting of members of the public as violations without proving that each person saw or relied on a particular misleading statement. That potential challenge puts the method used to count violations among the issues an appeals court may consider. The Associated Press said the state’s collection of the money could take years while the company appeals the ruling. In a market reaction, Meta shares rose 2% after the ruling was announced on October 21, 2026, the agency reported.

The ruling comes as Meta disclosed revenue of $200,966,000,000 in 2025, according to its filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. In the same filing, the company said the New Mexico ruling remains subject to appeal. This stage leaves the case’s final financial outcome tied to the appeal proceedings, while state law directs any collected money to education. The ruling differs from the Federal Trade Commission settlement and the New Mexico child safety case, as each involves a separate legal proceeding. The available evidence did not specify a date for an appeal hearing or a subsequent decision.