The Supreme Court decided to look at a lawsuit against Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook, regarding a situation where investors say they were given false information, causing the value of the company’s stock to fall.
The lawsuit is from large shareholders who claim Facebook misled them about a data-harvesting issue involving Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting firm.
This firm got access to Facebook user data without permission, and it was revealed in 2018. Meta agreed to pay $725 million to settle a lawsuit related to this issue.
Cambridge Analytica used the data for political purposes during the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign.
The scandal led to investigations by the government, and Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, had to testify before Congress.
The Supreme Court agreed to review the case, which questions if Facebook’s actions caused its stock prices to be higher than they should have been.
The investors argue that Facebook’s failure to disclose the misuse of user data caused the stock prices to drop in 2018, resulting in the company losing over $200 billion in market value.
The Court’s decision to review the case means it will look into whether a lower court made the right decision in allowing the lawsuit to proceed.