Nearly a decade after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, New Mexico alone is taking Facebook to trial

By MIKELLA SCHUETTLER, Associated Press/Report for America Attorneys representing the state of New Mexico told jurors that targeted political ads, attempting to lower Democratic turnout during the 2016 election, used Facebook data sold to a political consulting firm, during opening statements in a trial over the platform’s data protections. Facebook’s attorney said the social media company investigated suspicious third-party apps following the breach and told jurors the state’s evidence is outdated because safeguards have improved. Opening statements began in Santa Fe on Wednesday morning, just weeks after 48 U.S. states reached a landmark settlement with Meta, which addressed child safety concerns and privacy issues surrounding the same data breach. So far, New Mexico is the only state that has pushed the case toward trial, expected to last four weeks, as part of its go-it-alone approach to prosecuting Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram. In court documents, the state argues Facebook failed to alert or protect users from a personality quiz on the social platform that harvested data from roughly 87 million Facebook profiles and sold it to a political consulting firm, Cambridge Analytica. The data was used to generate targeted ads during the 2016 presidential election. Randi McGinn, the attorney representing New Mexico, said Cambridge Analytica used Facebook
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