WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Monday it will consider dropping a multimillion-dollar class action lawsuit against Facebook parent Meta stemming from the privacy scandal involving political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.
The judges agreed to Meta’s appeal against a lower court ruling that allowed the class action to proceed. Investors allege Meta failed to fully disclose the risks of Facebook users’ personal information being misused by Cambridge Analytica, a company that backed Donald Trump’s successful 2016 Republican presidential campaign.
Inadequacy of disclosures led to two significant drops in the price of the company’s stock in 2018 after the public learned about the extent of the privacy scandal, the investors say.
The case will be heard in the autumn.
Meta has already paid a $5.1 billion fine and reached a $725 million privacy settlement with users.
Cambridge Analytica had ties to Trump political strategist Stephen Bannon. It had paid a Facebook app developer for access to the personal information of about 87 million Facebook users. That data was then used to target American voters during the 2016 campaign.
