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dam_jackalopes • yesterday at 10:26 PM • 1 reply • view on HN

What makes it outlandish?


Replies

xp84 • yesterday at 11:48 PM

Outlandish on its face. In short, shouldn't the amount of money you expect for a fine be at least vaguely proportional to the harms caused?

Look at precedent[1]. Glyphosate and J&J talc are among the biggest awards (to be fair: they were settlements), and those allege that the defendants' products actually caused cancer -- actually killed people.

The tobacco settlement for 46 states was $206 billion. Again, for causing millions of deaths. New Mexico is 0.62% of the U.S. population, so less than $2 billion would be New Mexico's share of that.

Compare that to this 25 billion for the crime of illicitly letting political advertisers access too much of the interest data that Facebook users provided to Facebook?

The only way this penalty makes any sense is if you believe that the Cambridge Analytica scandal was the most heinous crime ever perpetrated by any company in U.S. history.

[1] https://verdictwiki.com/landmark-cases/

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