Facebook users who held an account at any time from 2007 to the end of last year can now apply for their share of the $725 million data privacy settlement.

Facebook’s parent company, Meta, has recently agreed to pay the sum to settle a host of data privacy-related class-action lawsuits alleging, among other things, that Facebook let third parties access its user’s private data and that of their friends without the user’s consent.

If you were a Facebook user from The United States for any period between May 24, 2007, and December 22, 2022, you are eligible to claim the settlement amount. You must submit your claim using this form – https://facebookuserprivacysettlement.com/#submit-claim by 11:59 pm PT on Friday, August 25 if you’re filing online. If you are filing by mail, your envelope must be postmarked by August 25.

How much will one be paid?

How much settlement amount one will get directly depends on three factors,

1) The Number of people who file valid claims.

2) For how long they were active users during the mentioned period.

3) The total net settlement amount after the deduction of administrative, legal, and other costs.

After all such calculations, based on how long you have been an active user of Facebook, Meta states that the settlement administrator will let you gain one point for each month you have an activated account.

After that, the administrator will add up all the points assigned to all the valid claims and then divide the net settlement amount by the total number of points you have gained.

The value that comes after all these calculations would be the amount paid for each month that you were an active user.

Let’s get clear through an example:

Suppose that the net settlement amount is $100 and the total number of points for all the claims adds up to 500, One shall be paid 20% ($100/500) for each month in the mentioned timeline, i.e., between May 2007 and December 2022. In that case, if your account was deactivated for 52 months, you will receive $10.40( 20% x 52 months).

When Will the Amount be Paid?

The exact date of receiving the claim is still not known. But after everyone’s claims are in, there will be a final approval hearing for the settlement of that case. The hearing is scheduled for September 7 at 1 p.m., according to Facebook.

Once the settlement is approved, you could get the payment, but it might get delayed if there are appeals. “Settlement payments will be distributed as soon as possible if the court grants Final approval of the settlement and after any appeals are fixed and resolved,” according to the FAQ sheet on the settlement site.

In case, the court changes the date of the approval hearing, the updated date and time will appear on the site as well.

After you know your eligibility, know when the deadline is to file the claim.

One can submit their claim using the mentioned form by 11:59 p.m. PT on Friday, August 25, if you’re filling it out online. If you are opting to claim through email, your envelope must be postmarked by August 25.