New Mexico Judge Orders Meta to Pay $25 Billion Over Facebook Privacy Deception

A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay the state $25 billion in penalties on Wednesday, October 21, 2026, Engadget reports. Judge Francis Mathew of the First Judicial District Court in Santa Fe imposed the penalty under the state's Unfair Practices Act, after a jury found that Meta misled Facebook users about their data privacy.

Meta has said it will appeal. KOB also reports two earlier rulings: a $375 million judgment in March over failing to protect children online, and a $567 million order in August meant to help reform Facebook and Instagram.

How a Jury Count Became a $25 Billion Penalty

A Santa Fe jury returned its verdict on September 25, 2026. It found that 26 of 29 challenged statements were false or deceptive, according to the Albuquerque Journal and IBTimes. The statements were made over 11 years by top Meta officials, including Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg, according to the Albuquerque Journal, and concerned user data, privacy settings and content moderation, Engadget reports.

IBTimes reports that the verdict form assigns 2.1 million violations each to 11 statements and 1,386,648 violations each to 15 others, a total of 43,899,720. The New Mexico Department of Justice gives 43,899,725, five more. Engadget gives about 43 million. The Albuquerque Journal also reports that jurors found each false statement applied to Facebook's 1.4 million New Mexico users in 2020, which could mean tens of millions of potential violations.

Each violation carries a maximum penalty of $5,000. Applied to the verdict-form total, that produces a theoretical ceiling of $219,498,600,000, or about $219.5 billion. The jury did not award that amount and did not set a penalty. That decision rested with the judge. Before the ruling, the Department of Justice said it would seek the maximum available amount, IBTimes reports.

IBTimes reports that Meta's second-quarter 2026 SEC filing said the attorney general had indicated an intent to seek up to $62.85 billion. The state asked for $35 billion to $40 billion. Meta proposed between $345 million and $3.45 billion, and its attorney, Matthew Nicholson, called a judgment in that range constitutionally problematic, the Albuquerque Journal reported before the ruling. Engadget cites Meta's proposal as no more than $3.45 billion.

Mathew's $25 billion is about 11% of the theoretical ceiling. Dividing $25 billion by the verdict-form total gives about $569 per violation. This is a calculation, not a reported figure.

What the Case Centers On and How Meta Has Responded

The case was filed in 2021. KOB describes it as concerning the leak of quiz data from at least 350,000 New Mexicans to Cambridge Analytica. Engadget reports that it centers on what Facebook told users, not on the data harvesting itself.

Meta reached a separate settlement with 47 other states and Washington, D.C., for $459 million combined over Cambridge Analytica claims, KOB reports. The Albuquerque Journal gives about $460 million for those claims, within a $17.1 billion settlement with 47 states. New Mexico did not join that settlement, Engadget reports. The Albuquerque Journal also reports that McGinn said Meta declined to settle with the state.

Judge Mathew described Facebook's promised post-scandal investigation as willfully ineffective, Engadget reports. The finding concerns an investigation the company had promised after the scandal. He also pointed to the repeated misstatements in the case.

Meta's chief legal officer, C.J. Mahoney, said the lawsuit seeks to impose a tax on speech, KOB reports. KOB reports that Meta said the ruling made it nearly impossible to do business in New Mexico, and it repeated a threat to possibly pull its products from the state.

Before the ruling, Meta's attorney, Matthew Nicholson, argued that the state's request would exceed any civil judgment in U.S. history, the Albuquerque Journal reports.

What Remains Open: Appeal, Interest and Reform Terms

Meta plans to appeal and says it will prevail, KOB reports. Randi McGinn, the attorney representing New Mexico, estimated to KOB that an appeal could take three to five years, and said the award below the maximum could help during the appeal. Attorney General Raúl Torrez also said an appeal could take years.

Engadget reports that interest accrues at 15% a year until the penalty is paid in full. The Albuquerque Journal reports that McGinn said the state is unlikely to receive money from the case for years.

KOB reports that the $567 million order from August was meant to help reform Facebook and Instagram.

Engadget and KOB both report that the money will go to New Mexico's school system. McGinn told KOB the funds must go toward schools, and Torrez said the state may have paid for school construction for the next several hundred years.