Facebook parent, Meta, earns billions from scam ads, internal docs show

Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, internally estimated that it would earn about 10% of its 2024 revenue — roughly $16 billion — from scam and prohibited ads, according to confidential company documents reviewed by Reuters.

The report paints a striking picture of a company aware that it profits from fraud but hesitant to clamp down for fear of hurting its bottom line. The internal files, spanning 2021 to 2025, show Meta struggled — and in some cases declined — to control a surge of fraudulent advertising, including fake investment schemes, illegal gambling, and counterfeit products.

One document cited by Reuters said Meta shows users around 15 billion “high-risk” scam ads daily, generating about $7 billion in annualized revenue from this category alone. The company’s automated systems flagged many of these marketers as suspicious but only banned them if it was “95% certain” of fraud. Those deemed less certain were merely charged higher ad rates, a system Meta called “penalty bids.”

“If regulators wouldn’t tolerate banks profiting from fraud, they shouldn’t tolerate it in tech,” said Sandeep Abraham, a former Meta safety investigator, criticizing the company’s reliance on income from questionable sources.

In response, Meta spokesman Andy Stone told Reuters that the internal documents “present a selective view that distorts Meta’s approach to fraud and scams.” He described the 10.1% revenue estimate as “rough and overly inclusive,” adding that later assessments put the figure lower because the calculation mistakenly included legitimate ads.

Stone said Meta had “aggressively fought fraud,” claiming a 58% global reduction in scam-related user reports over the past 18 months and the removal of 134 million pieces of scam content in 2025. Still, internal strategy papers reviewed by Reuters show the company intends only a gradual reduction — targeting scam-related ad revenue to fall from about 10% in 2024 to 7.3% by the end of 2025 and 5.8% by 2027.

The documents also suggest Meta’s platforms are deeply embedded in the global fraud economy. A May 2025 presentation by Meta’s safety division estimated that its platforms were involved in one-third of all successful scams in the United States, with fraudsters reportedly finding it “easier to advertise scams on Meta platforms than on Google.”

Regulatory pressure is mounting. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is investigating Meta over scam advertising, while a British regulator found the company’s platforms were linked to 54% of all payment-related scam losses in 2023 — more than all other social media firms combined.

According to Reuters, internal correspondence also shows that Meta set “revenue guardrails” to prevent enforcement teams from taking actions that would cost the company more than 0.15% of total income — about $135 million in early 2025 — even when dealing with fraudulent advertisers.

Despite bracing for potential fines of up to $1 billion, internal analysis suggested such penalties would remain smaller than the revenue Meta earns from scam ads every six months.

Meta has pledged to improve its systems, but the Reuters documents underscore an uncomfortable reality: the company’s global ad empire continues to generate billions, even from the world’s “scammiest scammers.”