LinkedIn has agreed to pay $6.625 million to settle a proposed class-action lawsuit accusing the social media site of inflating the number of video ad views.
The preliminary settlement was filed last week in federal court in San Jose, California, and is awaiting approval by U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen before the payment is confirmed.
LinkedIn, which has denied any wrongdoing, has agreed to hire an external auditor for two years to review its advertising metrics.
LinkedIn accused of inflating video ad views
The suit stems from a complaint filed by TopDevz, a Sacramento, California-based team of developers, designers, project managers and quality assurance testers, who claimed LinkedIn inflated ad views by counting video plays on its app even when users scrolled past them.
The legal action came just a couple of weeks after the Microsoft-owned platform confirmed it had fixed software bugs that resulted in more than 400,000 overcharges — a mistake LinkedIn corrected by issuing credits to many affected advertisers.
The $6.625 billion settlement covers US advertisers who bought ads on the platform between January 2015 and May 2023 and were subsequently overcharged to cover exaggerated numbers of views.
LinkedIn's parent company Microsoft confirmed a 17% increase in revenue for the quarter ending March 31. The company's total revenue stood at $61.9 billion, with LinkedIn posting a 10% increase in revenue. Microsoft is expected to announce its latest quarterly figures tomorrow.
TechRadar Pro has asked the company for comment on the lawsuit, but did not immediately receive a response.
