Get Permission Ending six years of litigation, a federal judge has signed off on a $650 million settlement of a class-action lawsuit against Facebook for violating Illinois' groundbreaking privacy law that restricts collecting biometrics data. The lawsuit claimed Facebook violated the rights of 1.6 million Illinois residents under Illinois' Biometric Information Privacy Act. The Illinois law is unusual because it allows citizens to bring class-action lawsuits and receive statutory damages for privacy violations, says Steven Teppler of the law firm Mandelbaum Salsburg P.C. While other states are considering similar biometrics privacy laws, many would not create a private right of action, leaving enforcement solely in the hands of the state's attorney general's office, he says.