Meta has been raking in the cash from scammy ads, according to new reporting from Reuters.
Last year, the tech company internally projected that it expected to make 10.1% of its overall annual revenue, or about $16 billion, from ads promoting scams and banned goods, ranging from illegal gambling, banned medical products, and fraudulent investment schemes, according to internal Meta documents between 2021 and 2025 that were reviewed by Reuters. That includes showing users roughly 15 billion “higher risk” scam advertisements on average each day, according to the documents.
Meta has estimated that it is now involved in as much as a third of successful domestic scams, according to a document detailing a May 2025 presentation given by Meta safety staff, which also noted that some tech rivals appear to be managing scam ads better than they are.
“It is easier to advertise scams on Meta platforms than Google,” Meta wrote in one internal review from April 2025.
In a statement to Marketing Brew about the report, Meta spokesperson Matthew Tye characterized the 10.1% figure as “a rough and overly-inclusive estimate,” noting that “so far in 2025, we’ve removed more than 134 million pieces of scam ad content.”
“The leaked documents present a selective view that distorts Meta’s approach to fraud and scams by focusing on our efforts to assess the scale of the challenge, not the full range of actions we have taken to address the problem,” he said.
Risky business? According to Reuters’ reporting, Meta requires that its automated systems determine there’s at least 95% certainty that an advertiser is committing fraud before instituting a ban, while advertisers scoring under that percentage but are still suspected of being fraudulent are instead charged higher ad rates to discourage them from placing ads.
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Meta estimated that in 2024 it earned “about $7 billion in annualized revenue” from higher-risk scam ads each year, according to Reuters’ reporting. The internal documents also indicated that users who click on fraudulent ads are more likely to be served them due to ad personalization.
High stakes: Last year, Meta reported $164.5 billion in revenue, a 22% increase compared to 2023; virtually all of Meta’s revenue is generated through advertising, much of which is programmatic.
As companies like Meta continue to report record revenues, there has been some global regulatory movement to better regulate and potentially penalize companies that allow fraudulent ads to proliferate. In the US, the Securities and Exchange Commission is currently investigating the platform for financial scam ads on the platform, Meta disclosed in internal documents obtained by Reuters, noting that it anticipates facing regulatory penalties.
Not the first time: Meta has been embroiled in a number of high-profile controversies over the years. In 2018, it was found that up to 87 million Facebook profiles in the US had data harvested by the consulting firm Cambridge Analytica in the lead up to the 2016 election. In 2021, Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen leaked internal studies to the Wall Street Journal showing the negative effects Instagram was having on teen girls, including an increase in suicidal thoughts and worsening eating disorders.
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