Mississippi court settlement: Microsoft has to pay $100 million

Mississippi settled an antitrust suit with Microsoft Corp for $100 million on Thursday. The settlement was approved by Hinds County Judge Denise Owens. It was the largest of 21 brought by U.S. states against the Microsoft.

In 2000 U.S. federal judge found that Microsoft misused its monopoly power by tying its Internet Explorer browser to its Windows operating system. Since that the company faced large quantity of class-action suits on behalf of consumers.

According to Mississippi attorney general Jim Hood, settlement stipulated that Microsoft would pay $40 million to the state within 40 days. $60 million would be divided between consumers, businesses, public school districts and government entities.

As he said later, if all vouchers were not claimed a further $8 million could go to the state.