The Hamburg Higher Regional Court has suspended proceedings brought by a major German consumer group against Meta, the parent company of Facebook, it said on Monday.
The Federation of German Consumer Organizations (vzbv) and Meta’s Irish subsidiary had previously failed to reach a settlement.
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg is now expected to decide whether the representative action brought by consumer advocates against Meta is admissible, a question that has remained unresolved since the trial began in October 2025.
Meta argues the case is inadmissible.
The case stems from a Facebook data breach between May 2018 and September 2019, after which data from more than 530 million users was circulated on the dark web in April 2021.
Consumer groups accuse Meta of violating data protection rules.
According to the vzbv, more than 14,000 consumers had joined the action by early October 2025. Representative actions, introduced in Germany in 2018, allow consumer organizations to sue on behalf of affected individuals.
A court spokesperson said it is unclear when proceedings at the Higher Regional Court would resume.
A ruling is expected to take several months once the ECJ has ruled on admissibility.
