Texas attorney general Ken Paxton has sued Meta after it found Facebook to be in violation of the state’s privacy laws, allegedly capturing and profiting from the use of biometric data of millions of Texans without their informed consent.

The lawsuit claims that, for more than a decade, Facebook has been “secretly capturing, disclosing, unlawfully retaining and profiting off of” personal and sensitive information of Texans – their facial geometries – using facial recognition technology.

“Facebook’s omnipresent empire was built on deception, lies and brazen abuses of Texans’ privacy rights – all for Facebook’s commercial gain,” the lawsuit reads.

It goes on to allege that Facebook concealed the “nature of its practices” by not using the term ‘biometric data’ which “tends to scare people off”. Texans were left “oblivious” to the fact that Facebook was selling their biometric data to third parties who “further exploited it”.

Storing biometric data, known as biometric identifiers in Texas law, without proper consent is illegal in the state as in many other jurisdictions. Biometric identifiers can include retina or iris scans, fingerprints, voiceprints, and records of hand or face geometry.

The lawsuit seeks civil penalties in the hundreds of billions of dollars, a person familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal, which reported that Meta responded by saying the claims against Facebook “are without merit and we will defend ourselves vigorously.”

In November, Meta announced that it will delete face recognition data from more than 1bn Facebook users collected over a decade. People who opted in for Facebook’s face recognition feature will no longer be automatically recognised in photos and videos on the platform.

Paxton, who has served as the attorney general of the state since 2015, also referred to “historic windfall profits” made by Meta in recent times, partly benefiting from the alleged exploitation of facial recognition. Revenue in the last quarter was $33.67bn, up 20pc over the previous year.

In particular, he found Facebook to be in violation of two Texas laws: Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier Act, also known as CUBI, and the Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

“Facebook will no longer take advantage of people and their children with the intent to turn a profit at the expense of one’s safety and well-being,” he said. “This is yet another example of Big Tech’s deceitful business practices and it must stop. I will continue to fight for Texans’ privacy and security.”

Even though Meta continues to make profits, its performance was lower than expected on many metrics in its most recent earnings call, with Facebook daily active users falling for the first time in the platform’s 18-year history.

Earlier this month, Meta was hit with criminal charges for the first time since the big name change after Australian mining magnate Andrew Forrest accused Facebook of failing to prevent scam ads using his name and image.

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