Court documents show that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, have reached a $37.5 million settlement in a lawsuit accusing the company of violating the privacy of some users by tracking the movements of users through their smartphones without permission. This is not the first time Facebook has been accused of tracking users.
This settlement was filed Monday in San Francisco federal court and still needs to be approved by a judge.
The settlement stems from claims that Facebook gathered location data on users who had turned off Location Services on their mobile devices. These claims violate California law and Facebook’s own privacy policy.
People in the United States who used Facebook after Jan. 30, 2015 are covered in this settlement.
Meta did not comment on the settlement.
If approved, this is the latest lawsuit Meta and Facebook have settled.
In February, Facebook agreed to a $650 million settlement after users claimed the company created and stored scans of their faces without permission, in violation of Illinois’ biometric laws. Nearly 1.6 million Facebook users from Illinois received payouts of $397.
In June, a district court in California gave preliminary approval of a $90 million class-action settlement after users claimed Facebook tracked people’s activities on external websites. This settlement has a final approval hearing set for Oct. 27, 2022.
Watch this:
Facebook FTC settlement puts Zuck personally on the hook
3:28
