Meta to Pay $37.5 Million Settlement For Tracking Users Locations

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Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has reached a settlement in a 2018 lawsuit that saw the company taken to court for utilizing users’ locations, without their consent.

According to Axios, the settlement, which was announced Monday, is for $37.5 million.

The plaintiffs Brendan Lundy, Myriah Watkins, Elizabeth Childers, Michelle Agnitti, and Robin Hodge, filed the lawsuit in 2018.

They alleged that despite not giving express permission to have their locations tracked while using Meta-owned apps, their locations were catalogued nonetheless.

This case, according to the settlement paperwork, comprised of two cases that were both filed with California Courts in 2018 under the same circumstances, Lundy v Facebook and Heeger v Facebook.

The settlement covers not only the plaintiffs that filed the suits but over 70 million Facebook users in the United States from January 30, 2015, to April 18, 2018.

According to Bloomberg Law, “Class members who submit claims through an online system will receive payments electronically or by check, according to the filing.”

This is not the first user tracking case settled this year with Meta. Back in February, the company agreed to pay $90 million to users whose locations continued to be tracked despite logging off apps owned by the company.