- ACCC will sue Facebook’s parent company, Meta for allegedly publishing scam advertisements featuring public figures endorsing money-making schemes
- They featured prominent Australians such as Dick Smith, TV presenter David Koch and former New South Wales premier Mike Baird, none of whom approved the ads
- The ads contained a link to a fake media article, where users were asked to sign up before being pressured into depositing funds into fraudulent schemes
- It is alleged Meta was aware of the scam ads on its Facebook platform, but did not take the necessary steps to handle the issue
The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission will sue Facebook’s parent company, Meta, for allegedly publishing scam advertisements featuring Australian public figures.
The ads were promoting cryptocurrency investments and other money making-schemes, which ended up scamming consumers.
They featured prominent Australians such as Dick Smith, TV presenter David Koch and former New South Wales premier Mike Baird, none of whom approved the ads.
The ads contained a link to a fake media article, where users were asked to sign up before being pressured into depositing funds into the fraudulent schemes.
It is alleged Meta was aware of the scam ads on its Facebook platform, but did not take the necessary steps to handle the issue.
The ads continued to appear on the platform, even after global complaints from public figures who had been used in similar ads.
ACCC Chair Rod Sims said one consumer lost more than $650,000 from the scam advertised on Facebook.
“Meta should have been doing more to detect and then remove false or misleading ads on Facebook, to prevent consumers from falling victim to ruthless scammers,” he said.
“Apart from resulting in untold losses to consumers, these ads also damage the reputation of the public figures falsely associated with the ads.
“Meta failed to take sufficient steps to stop fake ads featuring public figures, even after those public figures reported to Meta that their name and image were being featured in celebrity endorsement cryptocurrency scam ads.”