3 weeks ago
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Santa Clara County has go nan latest entity to writer Meta complete scam ads connected Facebook and Instagram. The lawsuit, brought by County Counsel Tony LoPresti, alleges that nan institution has profited from "a immense ecosystem of scam ads" that person defrauded elder citizens and different susceptible people.
The suit references a study past twelvemonth from Reuters that cited internal documents detailing nan billions of dollars scam advertisers person poured into Meta's platforms. Meta makes arsenic overmuch arsenic $7 cardinal a twelvemonth from specified ads, nan filing says. It besides claims that Meta's ain processes and policies person enabled scams.
Santa Clara, which is conscionable 1 region complete from Meta's Bay Area headquarters, says it's nan first specified lawsuit brought by a section civilian prosecutor. "While our region has surely benefited from nan tech boom, we can't beryllium idly by erstwhile we cognize bully and good that a tech elephantine is swindling nan nationalist to deed a gross target," LoPresti said during a property conference.
In a statement, a Meta spokesperson said nan institution would conflict nan lawsuit."This declare relies connected Reuters reporting that distorts our motives and ignores nan afloat scope of actions we return to combat scams each day," nan spokesperson said. "We aggressively conflict scams connected and disconnected our platforms because they're not bully for america aliases nan group and businesses that trust connected our services. We removed complete 159 cardinal scam ads past twelvemonth alone, launched caller devices to protect people, and collaborated pinch rule enforcement astir nan globe to disrupt these criminals."
Meta has faced continued scrutiny complete its handling of scammy advertisers. On Tuesday, nonprofit watchdog group nan Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) published a report connected Medicare-related scam ads connected Facebook targeting seniors.
The group recovered that Meta has made much than $14 cardinal from Medicare scams connected Facebook, galore of which were repetition offenders who had galore ads removed by nan institution successful nan past. The scams utilized galore strategies employed successful different types of fraudulent ads, including clone AI-generated celebrity endorsements.
"Scammers are wished criminals who usage progressively blase strategies to defraud group and evade discovery connected our platforms and crossed nan internet," Meta said successful a statement. "We aggressively conflict scams connected and disconnected our platforms because they're not bully for america aliases nan group and businesses that trust connected our services."
Meta past period was also sued by nan nonprofit Consumer Federation of America (CFA), which revenge a projected people action suit successful Washington D.C claiming nan institution has surgery user protection laws successful its handling of scam advertisements connected nan platform. The suit cited ads promoting "free" iPhones and $1,400 checks.
