Meta halts development of another major datacenter

Date:
Tue, 20 Dec 2022 12:08:52 +0000

Description:
Meta claims move was to implement design changes, but it could signal increasingly worrying woes for the company and a shift in priorities to the metaverse.

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Days after canceling a data center expansion in Denmark , Meta has announced that a raft of data centers set to be built across an Alabama campus have
been delayed indefinitely.

In a statement provided to The Register , the company claimed that it remains committed to the US-based cloud storage project, but that it was looking at design alterations.

"In order to best serve our needs for the future, we have decided to change the design of a portion of our Huntsville data center, which will result in a temporary construction pause," a Meta spokesperson said. Metas shifting priorities

We remain committed to this community, our local stakeholders, and our supply chain partners, the statement went on to say. We will work closely with our stakeholders to transition this project as efficiently as possible."

The companys Huntsville, Alabama data center campus was announced in 2018, expanded in June 2021, and is expected to create 300 jobs when, or if, it opens.

Several outlets, including The Register , are currently reporting that Meta
is likely moving away from projects of this kind to continue its relentless pursuit of AI and metaverse projects, including the consumer-targeted Horizon Worlds and the enterprise app Horizon Workrooms .

This is more than likely the case, but its possible that Meta is getting out of the data business while it still can.

As reported by The Click in March 2022, parents and guardians in Alabama
filed a class-action lawsuit in January that claimed the company illegally harvested, trafficked and stored images of children, violating their right to privacy.

It also reported that in 2020, Facebook paid $650 million in order to settle
a similar lawsuit in Illinois, first filed in 2015, which claimed the
companys facial recognition software violated user privacy according to the states Biometric Information Privacy Act.

In November 2021, Meta announced that it was shutting down the facial recognition system.

However, in February 2022, TechCrunch reported that Texas Attorney General
Ken Paxton had filed another lawsuit claiming that Facebooks use of the
system violated state privacy law to grow its empire and reap historic windfall profits, storing millions of biometric identifiers in uploaded photos. Read more

Meta hit with huge fine for leaking user data

Google, Meta and the rest will be forced to explain their mysterious

algorithms

Check out our list of the best cloud backup services right now

Although Meta has previously had a knack for brushing off settlements and fines, it may be looking to switch its focus to AI and the metaverse if it views sectors as carrying less risk. Meta, or Mark Zuckerberg at the very least , could also believe it has such a confident foothold in the metaverse that it can afford to make the change.

Meta evaded The Register s line of questioning on this issue, but the latter has previously reported that shareholders are getting antsy about the
companys metaverse plans .

As a result, Its entirely possible that recent cutbacks in the data sector
are both a cost-cutting drive and a defiant statement of intent. Heres our list of the best bare metal server hosting services right now



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/meta-halts-development-of-another-major-datacen ter


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