Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has successfully sued Facebook’s parent company Meta for $1.4 billion, alleging that the company improperly collected users’ biometric and facial data without giving them adequate notice.
According to Paxton, Meta, the company that was formerly known as Facebook, introduced a “tag” function in 2011 that used software that could identify and categorize faces in images.
According to Paxton, IBM did this by automatically activating the function without providing an explanation of how it operated. This breached both the state’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act and a 2009 state statute limiting the use of biometric data.
“Most Texans are unaware that for over ten years, Meta scanned almost every face in the pictures posted to Facebook with facial recognition software, recording the facial features of the subjects,” he said in a press release.
The settlement will be distributed over a five-year period, and according to Paxton, it is the biggest sum of money ever acquired by a single state against a company.
“This historic settlement demonstrates our commitment to holding the largest technology companies in the world accountable for their legal violations and infringements on Texans’ right to privacy,” stated Paxton. “The full weight of the law will be applied to any misuse of Texans’ private information.”
“We are happy to have this issue resolved and are eager to investigate more chances to increase our corporate investments in Texas, possibly even constructing data centers,” stated a representative for Meta.
Known for his strong conservative views, Paxton was almost removed from his position as attorney general last year due to claims of abuse of power. He has a history of criticizing big internet corporations and associating himself with right-wing Silicon Valley personalities such as Elon Musk.
Because of this, he is still under federal investigation, yet he has been mentioned as a possible U.S. attorney general in a future Trump administration.