On 31st July, it came to light that Meta had agreed to a USD 1.4 billion settlement with the state of Texas to resolve the allegations that the company, that owns Facebook and Instagram, was illegally gathering biometric data from millions of people from Texas without their consent. The data was collected via Meta’s facial recognition technology. The case against the tech giant was filed in 2022. It was noted as one of the first major lawsuits under Texas’s 2009 biometric privacy law, that puts the violator under the obligation of paying damages of up to USD 25,000 per violation.
In the lawsuit, Meta’s Facebook was accused of exploiting the “Tag Suggestions” feature to collect biometric data billions of times from the photos and videos uploaded by the users. Though Meta discontinued the feature and agreed to a settlement, it has not admitted to doing anything wrong.
Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton said in a statement that the settlement between the state and Meta has highlighted that the state is committed to holding major tech companies accountable for the violation of the privacy of the citizens. Notably, in 2020, a similar case was filed against Meta where the company paid USD 650 million as a settlement in a class-action lawsuit under Illinois’s biometric privacy law.
Despite the hefty settlement, Meta said in a statement that it intends to invest in Texas with the possibility of data centre developments. Notably, Texas and Meta agreed to settlement in May this year, just weeks before the trial against the tech giant was set to begin.
Meta was accused of running hundreds of ads selling cocaine, opioids and other drugs
In a separate controversy, Meta Platforms have come under scrutiny for running hundreds of ads on both Facebook and Instagram that directed users to online marketplaces where illegal drugs were being sold. There is a policy in place to ban the promotion of illicit substances on Meta platforms, but The Wall Street Journal’s review found that there were many ads that were openly marketing cocaine, prescription opioids and other drugs as recently as July 2024.
Tech Transparency Project, a non-profit organisation, identified 450 such ads between March and June this year. These ads managed to bypass content moderation systems by using photos to showcase drugs for sale. These photos had descriptions with links to private chat groups on Telegram and WhatsApp where the sale happened.
In a statement, Meta’s spokesperson said that the company has deployed AI tools that proactively detect and enforce content that violates the terms and conditions of the platforms. It has rejected hundreds of thousands of ads that violate the drug policy of the platforms. However, many ads were only disabled after the report came out by WSJ that highlighted the loopholes and gaps in the moderation efforts of Meta.
The matter is under investigation by the federal agencies as they explore if Meta had a role in these illicit sales adding to the legal troubles of the company. It has reignited discussions about Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act that shields online platforms from the liability of third-party content. Basically, the companies get a virtual free pass from accusations of being involved in such illicit sales.
Meta said it is working with the law-enforcement agencies in the matter to combat illegal activities on its platforms.
