A New Mexico judge has ordered Meta to pay $25 billion after ruling that the company must face financial consequences for misleading Facebook users about how it handled their personal information.

The ruling, (issued Wednesday), follows a September jury verdict finding that Facebook violated New Mexico’s consumer protection laws nearly 44 million times. The case dates back to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, when Facebook collected millions of users' personal information without their consent.

The penalty is the largest ever imposed against Meta, according to the Associated Press, and far exceeds the $5 billion fine Facebook received from the Federal Trade Commission in 2019.

But the case isn’t over. Meta plans to appeal, so the company may not have to pay the full amount. Here’s what happened and what it means for Facebook users.

The case began in 2021, when New Mexico sued Facebook, alleging it deceived consumers about privacy protections and how their personal information could be accessed and used.

At the center of the lawsuit was Cambridge Analytica, the now-defunct political consulting firm that obtained information from as many as 87 million Facebook profiles. The data was collected through a third-party personality quiz and used to help target political advertising during the 2016 presidential election.

New Mexico argued that Facebook repeatedly assured users they controlled their personal information while failing to adequately explain how third parties could access it.

The lawsuit also challenged statements about Facebook’s efforts to combat misinformation, enforce community standards and address hate speech.

In September, jurors found the company responsible for 43,899,725 violations of New Mexico’s Unfair Practices Act.

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