New Mexico took Meta to trial alone, a jury found nearly 44 million violations of state consumer protection law, and a judge ordered $25 billion — the largest fine the company has faced. Meta will appeal.
Meta must pay New Mexico $25 billion. It is the largest fine Mark Zuckerberg has ever seen, and it came from a case that could have been settled.
The cost of not joining in
Earlier this year Meta reached an $18 billion settlement with attorneys general in nearly every state. New Mexico's attorney general, Raúl Torrez, declined to sign, arguing the penalty was too small to make Meta change.
Judge Francis Mathew said the jury found Meta had repeatedly deceived users since 2010 about control of their data, third-party misuse, misinformation, hate speech and equal enforcement. The whole state of 2 million people was harmed.
The plan was in the internal messages
Mathew cited internal records: Zuckerberg was found writing 'give them a chance to change their privacy settings but obviously don't encourage it.' Meta also deliberately narrowed its internal definition of data misuse so it would have to notify fewer people — flagging 2 of 2,000 problem apps.
Meta had hoped the fine would track the $5 billion FTC settlement, expecting at most $3.4 billion. The judge said that settlement 'cannot be viewed in a vacuum' and that earlier penalties had not deterred Meta.
Meta plans to appeal, saying the ruling makes it 'all but impossible to do business' in New Mexico.
Why it matters
If $25 billion is only an eighth of what Meta makes in a year, is a fine a punishment or a line item? New Mexico's case hands every regulator a template: don't settle, go to trial, let a jury count the violations.
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