Meta investors settle $8bn lawsuit with Zuckerberg over Facebook privacy

Mark Zuckerberg has agreed to settle a multibillion dollar lawsuit with a group of shareholders over how top executives and directors at Meta handled repeated privacy violations by Facebook.

The shareholders were seeking $8bn (£6bn) in damages. It is unclear how much they agreed to settle for.

The settlement was announced on Thursday by a lawyer for the shareholders, just before the trial was about to enter its second day in a Delaware court. Meta declined to comment on the settlement.

The Meta shareholders had alleged that Mr Zuckerberg's actions led to the Cambridge Analytica scandal in which the data of millions of Facebook users was leaked and used by a political consulting firm.

The shareholders had asked the judge to order the 11 defendants named in the case to reimburse Meta for more than $8bn in fines and legal costs, which they say the company has had to pay in order to resolve claims of users' privacy breaches.

The shareholders also questioned the timing of share sales by top brass at the company.

Meta was formerly known as Facebook, and is the parent company of the social media platform, along with photo-sharing app Instagram and the messaging app WhatsApp.

The shareholder lawsuit was filed in 2018, after it was revealed that data from millions of Facebook users was accessed by Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting firm that worked for President Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign.

Among the defendants was Jeffrey Zients, who served as Meta director for two years starting in May 2018, and was also former President Joe Biden's White House chief of staff.

In testimony on Wednesday, Mr Zients acknowledged that a $5 billion Federal Trade Commission fine was substantial, but said that the company did not agree to pay it to protect Mr Zuckerberg from legal liability.

Other defendants included Peter Thiel, co-founder of Palantir Technologies, and Reed Hastings, co-founder of Netflix.

The settlement allows the defendants to avoid testifying under oath.

Former chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg had also been slated to testify.

"One thing that could have come out of a full trial is a full accounting of how Facebook came to adopt and approve any illegal practices," said Ann Lipton, a law professor at the University of Colorado.

"It's valuable for society to know how this happened and what went wrong that they were breaking the law, if they were breaking the law," Lipton added. "That kind of exposure serves a valuable social purpose. We won't get that accounting now."

Meta was not a direct party to the lawsuit but has said that its has invested billions of dollars in privacy reforms since 2019.

Prior to the settlement, Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick, a Delaware judge, was set to hear testimony through next week before rendering a decision.

Last year, Ms McCormick drew the ire of Tesla boss Elon Musk after she rejected his $56 billion pay package.

The electric vehicle-maker has left Delaware and reincorporated in Texas.