woensdag 21 oktober 2026

Meta ordered to pay $25bn to New Mexico in Cambridge Analytica data-privacy case

Jury had found Meta misled consumers after Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign obtained user data without consent

A judge in New Mexico ordered Meta Platforms to pay $25bn on ⁠Wednesday after a jury found the company had misled consumers in a case arising from allegations that a political consulting firm involved in Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign obtained data from millions of Facebook users ⁠without their consent.

“Facebook’s wrongdoing – ⁠over the course of years and systematically broadcast to the public – goes to the heart of Facebook’s core business practices,” Judge Francis Mathew wrote in his order following the verdict.

Mathew found that a penalty of more than $219bn was warranted, based on state law, but he reduced the figure to $25bn.

Protesters outside Meta’s headquarters in São Paulo holding up a cardboard cutout of chief executive Mark Zuckerberg.

A spokesperson for Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The state’s attorney general had sued Meta in 2021 following revelations that Cambridge Analytica, ⁠a British political consulting firm, had harvested personal data from as many as 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app.

The state accused Meta of lying to Facebook users in New Mexico about who had ‌access to their data, how the ‌company handles hate speech and misinformation posted on the platform, and other internal policies. The company knew that third parties had broad access to ‌users’ personal data, and it tolerated hate speech or other harmful content when it benefited the company’s bottom line, the state said.

Jurors on 25 September found that 26 of 29 statements made by the company and its leadership on those issues were misleading. They said the company had committed more than 43m violations of New Mexico’s consumer protection laws, based on the number of Facebook users or New Mexico residents who were the audience for each misleading statement.

State law allows a penalty of up to $5,000 per ‌violation, and directs that all of the money go to New Mexico’s school system, New Mexico’s attorney general, Raúl Torrez, told reporters after the verdict.

At a hearing on 1 October, Randi McGinn, a lawyer for New Mexico, had asked Mathew to award the state between $35bn and $40bn, saying that would be supported by the US constitution’s protections on due process and the jury’s verdict.

“This court should speak to Meta in the only language it understands, which is money, and the value of its stock price,” McGinn said.

In court filings, Meta urged Mathew to cap the penalties at $3.45bn, saying a higher penalty ran the risk of scaring businesses out of the ⁠state.

The evidence showed that Meta does not sell user data and New Mexico did not prove that any consumer had actually been misled, the company said in court filings.

The verdict was the second in six months by a Santa Fe jury in a lawsuit brought by the state of New Mexico against ‌Meta Platforms.

In the first trial, which ended in March, a Santa Fe jury found Meta misled users about young users’ safety on its Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp platforms and ordered the company to pay $375m in civil penalties.

After a second phase of that trial, a judge directed the company to pay $567m into a New Mexico fund for teen mental health and ordered Meta to implement measures to protect teen Facebook and Instagram users in New Mexico.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/oct/21/meta-fined-new-mexico-data-privacy-case

zaterdag 17 oktober 2026

Israeli settlers attack European diplomats in West Bank

Footage shows attacked French mayor in occupied West Bank

Israeli settlers attack European diplomats in West Bank

French mayor and archbishop also attacked during violent attempt to stop Palestinians harvesting olives

Israeli settler militants have attacked European diplomats, a French mayor and the archbishop of Cambrai in Taybeh, in the occupied West Bank, injuring three people and damaging a car, in the latest violent attempt to prevent Palestinians from harvesting olives on their own land.

Bernard Baudoux, mayor of Aulnoye-Aymeries, was wearing his red, white and blue sash of office and attempting to enter a vehicle with diplomatic plates when he was assaulted and knocked to the ground on Saturday.

The masked militant shouted “Vive la France” as he launched the attack, a witness said. Badoux’s wife, and Vincent Dollmann, archbishop of Cambrai, were also threatened by the group of seven men, some armed with clubs.

The group had joined the olive harvest on lands belonging to the Christian town of Taybeh, along with the French consul general in Jerusalem, his wife and other diplomats, and the Belgian and Polish consuls.

Settlers first attacked a group working on the lower slopes of hills near Taybeh. As well as stealing olives, they kicked, abused and assaulted a Palestinian woman in her 70s and beat a man so badly he needed six stitches for a head injury.

Then they approached the diplomats and Badoux, who was in Taybeh for the launch of a twinning agreement with his town in northern France. During the attack, the militants smashed the window of an armoured car belonging to the Belgian mission.

A smashed rear passenger window — The smashed window of mayor Badoux’s car. Photograph: Emma Graham-Harrison/The Guardian

Maxime Prévot, Belgium’s deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs, condemned the violence against Palestinians, foreign diplomats and journalists, and said his country would continue to push for European Union sanctions on settlers.

“Harvesting olives, reporting the news or carrying out diplomatic duties should never put anyone at risk of attack,” he said. “This violence cannot be separated from Israel’s illegal settlement policy … the occupation of the Palestinian territory must end.”

Palestinian residents of Taybeh have lived with years of escalating attacks from Israeli militants, but settlers had never targeted foreign diplomats there, said Father Bashar Fawadleh, the town’s parish priest.

“What happened today is not an isolated incident. It represents a deeply disturbing escalation in settler violence,” Fawadleh said.

Since the start of the annual olive harvest in late September, Israeli militants have used violence to stop Palestinians bringing in a crop that is economically and culturally vital to their communities.

Since 27 September, settlers have launched more than 170 attacks, Israeli rights group Yesh Din said. They killed at least four people, injured more than 100 and damaged thousands of trees, according to Palestinian authorities.

Even the presence of Israeli activists, diplomats, senior clergy and journalists no longer serves as a deterrence to extreme violence.

“If such violence can take place before international witnesses, one must ask what protection remains for local families and farmers when those witnesses are no longer present,” Fawadleh said. “No individual should have to risk physical assault simply to harvest olives from their own land.”

On Friday, Israeli militants attacked and severely injured Washington Post photographer Heidi Levine as she reported on the harvest in the town of Abu Falah. She required surgery on Saturday morning and is now in “moderate” condition, according to a spokesperson for Israel’s Beilinson hospital where she is being treated.

Israel had already severely restricted the harvest this year by imposing new rules barring Palestinians from trees located in Area C, an area under the Israeli military’s control, which comprises most of the West Bank’s agricultural land.

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, condemned the attacks and said police had opened an investigation. He said foreign diplomats risked attacks from Israeli civilians if they travelled in the occupied West Bank without military coordination.

Demanding diplomats give advance notification of travel violates both diplomatic conventions and international law, said one western diplomatic source who asked not to be named.

“Israel is in charge of security in Area B and C (the majority of the West Bank), so is obliged to assure safety there for all,” the source said.

A culture of near total impunity for Israeli violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank has prompted former prime minister Ehud Olmert to call for the international criminal court to intervene.

Gadi Eisenkot, an opposition politician and former general hoping to unseat prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in elections to be held later this month described the attack as “Jewish terror under the auspices of the Israeli government”.

Eisenkot backs Jewish Israeli expansion in occupied Palestine but wants militant violence brought under control because the attackers are “harming the settlement enterprise in [the West Bank] and national security”.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/oct/17/israeli-settlers-attack-european-diplomats-in-west-bank