If you're the kind of person that starts your day by rolling out of bed, grabbing your phone, and seeing Facebook notifications, then Meta, Facebook's parent company, owes you money.
Even if you're a sporadic Facebook user, you're entitled to your fair share of the $725 million settlement the company has agreed to pay for misleading users about the privacy of their data. If you had a Facebook account for any amount of time between May 24, 2007 and December 22, 2022 while also living in the U.S., you qualify for a payment as part of the settlement. It doesn't even matter if you deleted your account, so think back for any Facebook accounts you may have had.
The massive settlement stems from a class action lawsuit related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Meta is accused of allowing third parties to access its user's private information, while also misleading users about the privacy of their data. The lawsuit was filed four years ago after it was revealed that Cambridge Analytica, a data analytics firm that worked with the Trump presidential campaign, obtained the private information of 87 million Facebook users.
In order to get your money, you'll need to submit a claim on the website set up for the Facebook class-action lawsuit by August 25, 2023. You just provide your name and address plus the email, phone number, or user name associated with your Facebook account to verify you were a user. You can choose to get your money through direct bank deposit, PayPal, Venmo, or a couple of other methods.
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The amount that you'll get hasn't been determined yet — that's always how class action lawsuits work because it depends on how many people submit claim forms. But considering Facebook's dismal privacy track record and just how much money Mark Zuckerberg and his company have thanks to our personal data, no amount of money will be enough. We're still not going to turn it down, though.
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