New Mexico sues Facebook over Cambridge Analytica data breach

Opening statements are underway in a lawsuit filed by the New Mexico Department of Justice against Facebook over a massive data breach, according to KVIA.

The state is presenting key witnesses and experts, along with video depositions from Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg and former Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg. An associate professor is expected to testify that Facebook's messaging was engineered to mislead the public, according to KVIA.

The lawsuit centers on events that began in 2013, when a personality test application on Facebook collected data from millions of users worldwide without their consent. That data was later sold to Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting firm that used it for targeted advertising during the 2016 election cycle.

Facebook did not disclose the breach to users until 2018, when a whistleblower exposed what happened, according to the New Mexico Department of Justice. Zuckerberg and Sandberg are expected to address in their depositions what Facebook knew about the data scandal and how the company handled user information.

Sandberg joined Facebook in 2008 to help the company develop ways to turn user data into revenue, according to KVIA. The Cambridge Analytica scandal became one of the most significant data privacy breaches in social media history and prompted investigations and fines across multiple states and countries.