USA: Preliminary agreement reached in lawsuit against Facebook

Facebook reached a preliminary agreement in the lawsuit against it for damages for allowing third parties, including Cambridge Analytica , access to private data of its users, according to reports.

According to a court document filed on August 26 in a San Francisco court , Facebook stated that it was preparing an “in principle agreement” and requested to suspend proceedings for 60 days “to terminate the agreement in writing and appear in court.” The social network did not indicate the amount or the terms with which it will address this class action lawsuit.

The settlement comes as Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and CEO Sheryl Sandberg - who resigned last June after 14 years with the company - were called to testify in court in September in this case.

In a process that began in 2018, Facebook users accused the social network of violating privacy protection rules by sharing their data with third parties, including Cambridge Analytica , which is linked to Donald Trump 's 2016 presidential campaign . In July In 2019, federal authorities fined Facebook $5 billion for "misleading" its users and imposed independent oversight on the handling of personal data.

Since the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke , Facebook withdrew access to its data for thousands of apps, restricted what information developers can access in general, and made it easier for its users to set permissions to share personal data.