Check Your Venmo Account—You Might Have a Payment From Facebook

On Monday afternoon, I took a break from editing articles and decided to check my phone. To my surprise, I saw an unexpected Venmo payment worth $38.36 from none other than Facebook. It took me a minute to jog my memory, but it came back to me: I had filed a claim in 2023 for being a Facebook user between 2007 and 2022—and I was finally receiving my piece of the pie.

Back in 2023, a lawsuit began where several plaintiffs accused Facebook of sharing user data with third parties—without their permission. These third parties include app developers, business partners, advertisers, data brokers, and more. As a result of the lawsuit, Facebook agreed to settle and pay $725 million to eligible users. Now, two years later, those users who opted into the settlement are seeing money come their way.

Who’s Eligible for the Facebook Settlement Payments?

If you were a Facebook user between May 24, 2007, and Dec. 22, 2022, then you were eligible to sign up for the Facebook settlement. The deadline for opting into the settlement was Aug. 25, 2023. If you filed a claim by that deadline, and your information was reviewed as being part of the data that was distributed to third parties, you should have received an email in 2023 and/or 2024 with information regarding your approval (I personally got a few emails during this time).

Venmo Isn’t the Only Way to Receive a Payment

The settlement payments will be sent out over the course of the 10-week period following the final court order dated Aug. 27, 2025. If you are receiving a payment, you should receive an email a few days prior to the payment being made.

I received my payment via Venmo because this is what I chose when filing the claim back in 2023. If you’re like me, you may have forgotten which payment method you selected. So check your Venmo, but also check your PayPal, bank account (for ACH and Zelle payments), and email (you may have received a virtual prepaid Mastercard).

How Much Money Are You Getting From Facebook?

The amount you receive from the Facebook Consumer Privacy User Profile Litigation Settlement Administrator is dependent on a few factors:

• How long you had an active Facebook account between May 2007 and December 2022
• How many claims were filed as part of the settlement

According to the Plan of Allocation document, once that information was reviewed, a net settlement fund amount was determined and then was divided by the number of claimants and their number of months of active Facebook accounts during that time period.

Court documents then state that this final value was translated into points. From there, your personal amount is based on the number of points you receive, which is based on the number of months in which your Facebook account was active during that time.

I personally have had an active Facebook account since October 2006. Based on my history and active use of Facebook, I can assume the amount I received is the maximum amount of money that any eligible user may receive—$38.36. However, I have not been able to confirm this from the court documents. It all depends on the value of the point system and the length of time that your Facebook account was active during the time period.

The Bottom Line

Keep an eye out for emails and payments from various websites and platforms that you engage with. You never know when you may be eligible to sign up to receive money as part of a lawsuit and settlement. And be patient—settlements can take years, as with this Facebook Inc. Consumer Privacy User Profile Litigation. It may be smart to opt in when you receive a notice because it could mean a payout later on—and your future self will thank you.