Aussie Consumer Watchdog Sues Meta Over ‘Scam Ads’

Facebook's parent company, Meta, is being sued by the Aussie consumer watchdog over 'scam ads' featuring prominent Australians.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission alleges the social media giant failed to act against false, misleading, and deceptive conduct by publishing scam advertising.

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The ACCC claims that Meta effectively promoted targeted 'scam ads', using images of well-known Aussies, including businessman Dick Smith, TV presenter David Koch, and former New South Wales premier Mike Baird as fake endorsements.

"The essence of our case is that Meta is responsible for these ads that it publishes on its platform," ACCC chair Rod Sims said.

"It is a key part of Meta's business to enable advertisers to target users who are most likely to click on the link in an ad to visit the ad's landing page, using Facebook algorithms"

"Those visits to landing pages from ads generate substantial revenue for Facebook," Sims said.

Dick Smith told the ABC he was "glad" the ACCC was taking action.

“I’m very disappointed about the number of Australians who lost money in these scams," he said.

In a statement, Meta said they did not want to see "ads seeking to scam people out of money or mislead people on Facebook".

"We use technology to detect and block scam ads and work to get ahead of scammers' attempts to evade our detection systems," a Meta spokesperson said.

The ACCC claim that advertisements on Facebook and Instagram allegedly promoting fake cryptocurrency investments or other financial schemes were likely to mislead Australian consumers.

It follows a separate criminal hearing launched by well-known Australian businessman Andrew 'Twiggy' Forrest against Meta last month.

ACCC’s case is set to take place in the Western Australia Magistrates Court later this month. 

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