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US Senators Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal Calling for an investigation To Meta for its alleged role in profiting from fraud-laden ads on Facebook and Instagram. demand Reuters investigation follows It was reportedly based on internal Meta documents that estimated that roughly 10% of Meta’s 2024 revenue — about $16 billion — came from alleged “illicit advertising.”
In a letter to the Federal Trade Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission, the lawmakers urged regulators to “immediately open investigations and, if the reports are accurate, pursue aggressive enforcement actions…to force Meta to concede profits, pay penalties, and agree to stop running such ads.”
One document reportedly claimed that Meta earned $3.5 billion in just six months from what it classified as “high-risk” fraudulent advertising.
The same internal records reportedly indicate that several ads that allegedly violated the fraud rules were allowed to run because they “did not apply to many ads… (which staff believed) ‘violated the spirit’ of its rules against fraudulent advertising.”
Meta denies all these allegations.
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Why is this important to you?
The scale of this alleged fraud raises serious concerns about Meta’s business model. Many wonder if the company is doing enough to monitor its advertising ecosystem, given that its main revenue stream appears to be tied to deceptive or outright fraudulent campaigns.
The senators claim that lax Meta enforcement – along with the continued presence of gambling ads and payment scams – Political deepfakes and other dangerous content in its public ad library – highlights significant risks.
In their letter, Hawley and Blumenthal highlight that a 58% reduction in fraudulent ad reports over 18 months, Meta says, may not tell the whole story. They pointed to broader trends suggesting that, according to their own reading of the documents, meta platforms may have been involved in “about a third of all fraud in the United States” and linked to more than $50 billion in consumer losses last year.
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What Meta says
Meta responded defensively to this call for investigation.
Andy Stone, a spokesman for Meta, criticized the senators’ claims as “exaggerated and false”, insisting that the company “aggressively fights scams and scams because people on our platforms don’t want this content, legitimate advertisers don’t want it, and we don’t want it either.”
Persistent misinformation on meta platforms
Among the most provocative claims is that some fraudulent ads impersonate government figures or political leaders. The senators point to specific examples, including a false ad that falsely claimed that President Donald Trump was offering $1,000 to food aid recipients.
It also raises concerns that foreign cybercrime groups based in countries such as China, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and the Philippines could be behind several fraud campaigns.
Overall, the senators’ push for action by the FTC and SEC seeks to hold accountable a social media giant whose advertising system may be fueling fraud on an unprecedented scale, even as Meta publicly stresses its commitment to user safety. Given that much of Meta’s work is likely related to high-risk advertising, the outcome of any investigation could reshape not only its practices but also the broader regulatory outlook for big tech companies in the future.
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