The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is taking Meta Platforms, Inc. (formerly Facebook) to Federal Court, alleging that the company and its Irish branch engaged in "false, misleading or misleading conduct". misleading" by posting fraudulent celebrity crypto ads.
Some users have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars to the sophisticated and long-running scams tied to the ad.
The spotlight on Meta has been on in Australia since early February, with Cointelegraph previously reporting that the ACCC was investigating the firm about allegedly fraudulent crypto ads. Australian mining billionaire Andrew Forrest also took legal action against the company for hosting ads that allegedly used its name to defraud victims.
in an ad aware Earlier today, the ACCC claimed that Meta "aided and abetted or knowingly engaged in false or misleading conduct and representations by advertisers."
The ACCC highlighted unapproved or endorsed "scam" advertisements featuring prominent Australian figures such as businessman Dick Smith, television presenter David Koch and former New South Wales Premier Mike Baird.
The regulator stated that the ads contained dubious links directing users away from Facebook to a fake media article that featured quotes attributed to the public figure allegedly endorsing a โmoney-making or cryptocurrency scheme.โ
โUsers were then invited to register and were subsequently contacted by scammers who used high-pressure tactics, such as repeated phone calls, to convince users to deposit funds into the fake schemes,โ the announcement reads.
ACCC Chairman Rod Sims didn't mince words when he stated that "Meta is responsible for these ads it posts on its platform" and that the company stood to gain financially by not removing them:
โIt is a key part of Meta's business to enable advertisers to target users who are most likely to click an ad's link to visit the ad's landing page, using Facebook's algorithms. Those visits to the ad landing pages generate substantial revenue for Facebook.โ
โIn one shocking case, we know of a consumer who lost more than $650,000 because one of these scams was falsely advertised as an investment opportunity on Facebook. This is disgraceful,โ she added.
Related: Instagram will add NFT soon, says Mark Zuckerberg
The ACCC argues that the company's conduct has breached the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) or the Australian Securities and Investments Commission Act (ASIC Act), and is seeking "declarations, injunctions, penalties, costs and other orders."
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