Unfortunately, the fact that Facebook or Meta repeatedly violates user privacy and data protection is nothing new. It is all the more gratifying when lawsuits against it are successful. More or less. Facebook's parent company, Meta, has now agreed to a $37.5 million settlement accusing the company of violating users' privacy by tracking their movements without permission - around 53 cents each of the affected 70 million users in the USA.
The lawsuit
A class action lawsuit filed in 2018 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California accuses Meta of tracking the location of Facebook users without permission and inferring their location based on their IP address in order to target them with advertising show what of course violates data protection.
"Despite Facebook's assurances that it only receives location information from users' devices if they allow it, Facebook has secretly obtained detailed location information from users regardless of whether a user has opted in or out on their device."
Excerpt from the statement of claim
It wasn't until the EU began enforcing the sweeping General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in 2018 that Facebook " realized that it needed to clarify its data collection practices in its data policies ," according to the complaint, which said Facebook had previously specifically alleged that the collection of location data is carried out on a voluntary basis.
Who is entitled to the money from the settlement?
A preliminary settlement was filed in federal court in San Francisco on August 22 and still requires final approval from a judge. The settlement affects approximately 70 million U.S. residents who used Facebook between January 30, 2015 and April 18, 2018 and disabled location services for the Facebook application on their iOS or Android devices.
In purely mathematical terms, each of these 70 million users is entitled to around 53 cents, rather less, since 30 percent of the settlement amount goes to the plaintiffs' legal fees. Not quite enough for a visit to Disneyland, but it's more about the principle that Facebook "spied" on its users without permission.
Eligible class members can then file their claim through a yet-to-be-created settlement website and then receive payment by check or direct deposit.
Does the comparison impact users in Europe?
This is quite possible, as the settlement has set a precedent and another precedent from the beginning of August , in which the highest court of the European Union determined that derived data is also considered personal data, could have major implications for data protection subject to.
Specifically, the judgment of August 1st stated that so-called ad tracking can constantly draw conclusions about users in order to display personalized advertising - and this is also made possible by location tracking, which is what the current judgment was about .
The combination of both judgments could mean that not only Facebook, but also other sites will have to completely change their advertising behavior and further lawsuits can be expected - and users will be given at least some of their privacy back.
Article image: Pixabay
Sources: Reuters , 9to5Mac , Cnet , Bloomberg Law
Also interesting:
Currently, several Facebook pages with the name “Social Network Registry Corporation” are tagging various companies and want to lure them to a fake page!
– Attention, phishing: The Facebook pages “Social Network Registry Corporation”
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