Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is set to testify this week in a high-stakes $8 billion trial in Delaware, where shareholders accuse him and other top leaders of running Facebook as an illegal operation. They say Meta violated a 2012 FTC agreement by letting user data be harvested, most notably in the 2018 Cambridge Analytica scandal. The lawsuit targets Zuckerberg, former COO Sheryl Sandberg, and board members like Marc Andreessen, Peter Thiel, and Reed Hastings, as plaintiffs claim they should repay the $8 billion in penalties, including a $5 billion FTC fine.
Investors are arguing this case under a rare legal theory: directors didn't just make mistakes, they failed their oversight duties. They also claim Zuckerberg sold stock using non-public info, making around $1 billion. Meta counters that privacy protections were improved and that Cambridge Analytica misled the company. The eight-day trial will explore internal board meetings and decisions—a test not just for Meta, but for corporate accountability at large.
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