WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is allowing a multibillion-dollar class action investors’ lawsuit to proceed against Facebook parent Meta, stemming from the privacy scandal involving the Cambridge Analytica political consulting firm.
The justices heard arguments in November in Meta's bid to shut down the lawsuit. On Friday, they decided that they were wrong to take up the case in the first place.
The high court dismissed the company’s appeal, leaving in place an appellate ruling allowing the case to go forward.
Investors allege that Meta did not fully disclose the risks that Facebook users’ personal information would be misused by Cambridge Analytica, a firm that supported Donald Trump ’s first successful Republican presidential campaign in 2016.
Inadequacy of the disclosures led to two significant price drops in the price of the company’s shares in 2018, after the public learned about the extent of the privacy scandal, the investors say.
Meta spokesman Andy Stone said the company was disappointed by the court's action. “The plaintiff’s claims are baseless and we will continue to defend ourselves as this case is considered by the District Court,” Stone said in an emailed statement.
Meta already has paid a $5.1 billion fine and reached a $725 million privacy settlement with users.
Cambridge Analytica had ties to Trump political strategist Steve Bannon. It had paid a Facebook app developer for access to the personal information of about 87 million Facebook users. That data was then used to target U.S. voters during the 2016 campaign.
The lawsuit is one of two high court cases involving class-action lawsuits against tech companies. The justices also are wrestling with whether to shut down a class action against Nvidia. Investors say the company misled them about its dependence on selling computer chips for the mining of volatile cryptocurrency.
FILE - The Supreme Court is seen in Washington, Nov. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
FILE - The Meta logo is seen at the Vivatech show in Paris, France, on June 14, 2023. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus, File)
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — NATO and Ukraine will hold emergency talks Tuesday after Russia attacked a central city with an experimental, hypersonic ballistic missile that escalated the nearly 33-month-old war.
The conflict is “entering a decisive phase,” Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Friday, and “taking on very dramatic dimensions.”
Ukraine’s parliament canceled a session as security was tightened following Thursday's Russian strike on a military facility in the city of Dnipro.
In a stark warning to the West, President Vladimir Putin said in a nationally televised speech that the attack with the intermediate-range Oreshnik missile was in retaliation for Kyiv’s use of U.S. and British longer-range missiles capable of striking deeper into Russian territory.
Putin said Western air defense systems would be powerless to stop the new missile.
Ukrainian military officials said the missile that hit Dnipro had reached a speed of Mach 11 and carried six nonnuclear warheads each releasing six submunitions.
Speaking Friday to military and weapons industries officials, Putin said Russia is launching production of the Oreshnik.
“No one in the world has such weapons,” he said with a thin smile. “Sooner or later other leading countries will also get them. We are aware that they are under development."
But he added, "we have this system now. And this is important.”
Testing the missile will continue, “including in combat, depending on the situation and the character of security threats created for Russia,” Putin said, noting there is ”a stockpile of such systems ready for use.”
Putin said that while it isn’t an intercontinental missile, it’s so powerful that the use of several of them fitted with conventional warheads in one attack could be as devastating as a strike with strategic — or nuclear — weapons.
Gen. Sergei Karakayev, head of Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces, said the Oreshnik could reach targets across Europe and be fitted with nuclear or conventional warheads, echoing Putin's claim that even with conventional warheads, “the massive use of the weapon would be comparable in effect to the use of nuclear weapons.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov kept up Russia's bellicose tone on Friday, blaming “the reckless decisions and actions of Western countries” in supplying weapons to Ukraine to strike Russia.
"The Russian side has clearly demonstrated its capabilities, and the contours of further retaliatory actions in the event that our concerns were not taken into account have also been quite clearly outlined," he said.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, widely seen as having the warmest relations with the Kremlin in the European Union, echoed Moscow's talking points, suggesting the use of U.S.-supplied weapons in Ukraine likely requires direct American involvement.
“These are rockets that are fired and then guided to a target via an electronic system, which requires the world’s most advanced technology and satellite communications capability,” Orbán said on state radio. “There is a strong assumption … that these missiles cannot be guided without the assistance of American personnel.”
Orbán cautioned against underestimating Russia’s responses, emphasizing that the country’s recent modifications to its nuclear deployment doctrine should not be dismissed as a “bluff.” “It’s not a trick… there will be consequences,” he said.
Separately in Kyiv, Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský called Thursday's missile strike an “escalatory step and an attempt of the Russian dictator to scare the population of Ukraine and to scare the population of Europe.”
At a news conference with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, Lipavský also expressed his full support for delivering the necessary additional air defense systems to protect Ukrainian civilians from the “heinous attacks.”
He underlined that the Czech Republic will impose no limits on the use of its weapons and equipment given to Ukraine.
Three lawmakers from Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, confirmed that Friday's previously scheduled session was called off due to the ongoing threat of Russian missiles targeting government buildings in central Kyiv.
In addition, there also was a recommendation to limit the work of all commercial offices and nongovernmental organizations "in that perimeter, and local residents were warned of the increased threat,” said lawmaker Mykyta Poturaiev, who added this is not the first time such a threat has been received.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office continued to work in compliance with standard security measures, a spokesperson said.
Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate said the Oreshnik missile, whose name in Russian means “hazelnut tree,” was fired from the Kapustin Yar 4th Missile Test Range in Russia’s Astrakhan region, and flew 15 minutes before striking Dnipro.
Test launches of a similar missile were conducted in October 2023 and June 2024, the directorate said. The Pentagon confirmed the missile was a new, experimental type of intermediate-range missile based on its RS-26 Rubezh intercontinental ballistic missile.
Thursday's attack struck the Pivdenmash plant that built ICBMs when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. The military facility is located about 4 miles (6 1/2 kilometers) southwest of the center of Dnipro, a city of about 1 million that is Ukraine’s fourth-largest and a key hub for military supplies and humanitarian aid, and is home to one of the country’s largest hospitals for treating wounded soldiers from the front before their transfer to Kyiv or abroad.
The stricken area was cordoned off and out of public view. With no fatalities reported from the attack, Dnipro residents resorted to dark humor on social media, mostly focused on the missile’s name, Oreshnik.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russia struck a residential district of Sumy overnight with Iranian-designed Shahed drones, killing two people and injuring 13, the regional administration said..
Ukraine’s Suspilne media, quoting Sumy regional head Volodymyr Artiukh, said the drones were stuffed with shrapnel elements. “These weapons are used to destroy people, not to destroy objects,” said Artiukh, according to Suspilne.
—— Associated Press journalists Lorne Cook in Brussels, Samya Kullab in Kyiv, Dasha Litvinova in Tallinn, Estonia, and Justin Spike in Budapest, Hungary, contributed.
—— Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin gestures while speaking during a meeting with the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense, representatives of the military-industrial complex and developers of missile systems at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
Russian Presidential Aide Aleksei Dyumin, left, Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, second left, the head of Russian state space corporation Roscosmos Yuri Borisov, third right, and other wait for the meeting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense, representatives of the military-industrial complex and developers of missile systems at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (Vyacheslav Prokofyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a meeting with the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense, representatives of the military-industrial complex and developers of missile systems at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, left, and the head of Russian state space corporation Roscosmos Yuri Borisov talk while waiting for the meeting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense, representatives of the military-industrial complex and developers of missile systems at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (Vyacheslav Prokofyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriiy Sybiha speaks to journalists during joint press conference with Czech Republic's Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky in Kyiv, Ukraine, November 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Czech Republic's Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky speaks to journalists during a joint press conference with Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriiy Sybiha in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Czech Republic's Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky speaks to journalists during a joint press conference with Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriiy Sybiha in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Czech Republic's Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky walks after a joint press conference with Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriiy Sybiha in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
In this photo taken from a video released by Russian Defense Ministry press service on Friday, Nov. 22, 2024, Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, left, gives an award to Russian serviceman of the Battlegroup North in an undisclosed location. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this photo taken from a video released by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Friday, Nov. 22, 2024, a Russian engineer troops serviceman operates at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this photo taken from a video released by Russian Defense Ministry press service no Friday, Nov. 22, 2024, Russian T90M Proryv tank fires towards Ukrainian positions at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
