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The
terms of the settlement, disclosed on Tuesday, mark the largest
accord ever by any single state, according to the lawyers for
Texas, whose legal team included the plaintiffs firm Keller
Postman.
The lawsuit, filed in 2022, was the first major case to be
brought under Texas' 2009 biometric privacy law, according to
law firms tracking the litigation. A provision of the law
provides damages of up to $25,000 per violation.
Texas accused Facebook of capturing biometric information
"billions of times" from photos and videos that users uploaded
to the social media platform as part of a free, discontinued
feature called "Tag Suggestions."
A spokesperson for Meta said the company is pleased to resolve
the matter and looks forward to "exploring future opportunities
to deepen our business investments in Texas, including
potentially developing data centers."
It has continued to deny any wrongdoing.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a statement said the
settlement marks the state’s "commitment to standing up to the
world’s biggest technology companies and holding them
accountable for breaking the law and violating Texans’ privacy
rights."
Texas and Meta said they reached an accord in May, weeks before
the start of a trial in state court was scheduled to begin.
Meta separately agreed to pay $650 million in 2020 to settle a
biometric privacy class action that was brought under an
Illinois privacy law that is considered one of the nation's most
stringent. The company also denied wrongdoing.
Alphabet’s Google separately is fighting a lawsuit by Texas
accusing the company of violating the state’s biometric law.
(Reporting by Mike Scarcella in Washington, D.C. and Jody Godoy
in New York; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Marguerita Choy)
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