Facebook has donated the settlement funds for a recent lawsuit that was filed against it to charity. Five Facebook users filed a lawsuit against the website when ‘sponsored story’ advertisements began appearing on their pages. Essentially, what happened is that a user clicked the like button on an advertisement, and subsequently that user’s friends received the advertisement as a sponsored story on their Facebook page.

The five members argued that the advertisements violated Facebook members’ rights to control their activity on the website. In particular, they were not allowed to opt out of showing their likes on the advertisement, nor were the paid for doing it.

Judge Lucy Koh presiding wrote:

California has long recognised a right to protect one’s name and likeness against appropriation by others for their advantage.

The court sided with the plaintiffs, and Facebook stated that the settlement fees were paid to charity.