Facebook Paid Billions Extra In Cambridge Analytica Case To Protect Mark Zuckerberg

Did Facebook pay extra money to the US trade body to protect Mark Zuckerberg? It appears so. A lawsuit alleges that Facebook paid $4.9 billion extra to the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in the settlement for the Cambridge Analytica scandal in a bid to shield Mark Zuckerberg.

Turns out that the hefty $5 billion settlement amount was partly driven by the company's hopes to prevent Mark Zuckerberg from being named in the FTC complaint.

Reuters

Why did FTC fine Facebook?

In 2019, the FTC had fined Facebook for "deceiving" users about the company's ability to keep user information confidential. This FTC fine was initiated after investigations that went for over a year after the Cambridge Analytica data breach came to light, wherein millions of Facebook profiles of US voters were harvested.

Also read: Facebook Is Hiding 'Real' News Feed Content From Safety Observers, Says Report

The shareholder lawsuit was filed in Delaware last month and alleged that Zuckerberg, COO Sheryl Sandberg, and other Facebook directors agreed to the heavy settlement to "protect Zuckerberg from being named in the FTC's complaint, made subject to personal liability, or even required to sit for a deposition".

Reuters

What are the new allegations?

The lawsuit also claims that the social media company paid $4.9 billion over what was required under the "applicable stature". In addition, the lawsuit claims that if Facebook founder Zuckerberg was actually named in the lawsuit, then he could have faced fines for violations in the future while causing "extensive reputational harm".

Also read: WhatsApp Will Show Ads Inside The App Soon, A Facebook Executive Said

Reuters

After the $5 billion fine was announced, Mark Zuckerberg took to Facebook to announce how they were making "major structural changes" to how the company builds its products.

A Facebook spokesperson claimed on Twitter that is not a "new" allegation and that the company intends to acknowledge these claims of paying extra "during the litigation".

Portraying this as some kind of new allegation is wrong. The suggestion that we overpaid or underpaid on this settlement isn't new and is something we will address during the litigation. Here's the claim from two years ago. https://t.co/oJyKJGEqek

¡ª Andy Stone (@andymstone) September 21, 2021

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