Meta fined USD 1.4 billion for unlawful use of facial recognition

Meta (formerly Facebook) agreed to pay a USD 1.4 billion fine to settle a lawsuit with the state of Texas over allegations of illegally collecting biometric data using facial recognition. 

In a lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in 2022, Meta was accused of collecting biometric data, specifically facial recognition data, from millions of users without obtaining their informed consent, which is required under Texas law. 

Meta agreed to settle the lawsuit by paying USD 1.4 billion, marking the largest privacy settlement ever obtained by a US state attorney general.

The lawsuit had claimed that Meta breached the Texas Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier Act, which prohibits private entities from capturing, disclosing, or profiting from biometric identifiers without informed consent. 

Meta was also alleged to have violated the Deceptive Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Act by implementing facial-recognition-based photo and video tagging features without proper user consent.

This case is part of broader scrutiny of Meta's privacy practices, following other significant privacy-related fines and settlements, such as a USD 5 billion settlement with the Federal Trade Commission in 2019 and a USD 1.3 billion fine by the European Union in 2023 for separate privacy violations.