Where do Meta scams come from?

Meta scams often come from organized operations rather than lone scammers. In their study, our Threat Researchers repeatedly traced clusters of scam campaigns to payment and infrastructure linked to China and Hong Kong, run through short-lived pages set up mainly to push ads, indicating that a polished, local-looking ad — like many social media scams — can still trace back to an industrial operation.

Who’s behind Meta scam ads?

A small number of advertisers seem to cause most of the harm. Our Threat Researchers found that the top 10 scam advertisers accounted for about 56% of all the scam ads they identified: roughly 2.5 million ads from just a handful of operators. These tend to be organized, persistent groups running high volumes of disposable ads through throwaway accounts, not one-off bad actors.

How do you report scam ads?

You can report a scam ad in a few steps. On Facebook or Instagram, tap the ••• menu on the ad, choose Report ad, and pick the option for a scam or misleading ad; other platforms like YouTube have similar ad-reporting options. To help authorities track fraud, also report it to the FTC and, if you lost money, to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center.

Meta scam ads: Breaking down Meta’s malvertising machine

A study by Gen (the company behind Norton) found that nearly one in three ads (30.99%) on Meta’s EU/UK platforms led to a scam, phishing, or malware link.
According to 2025 reporting by Reuters, Meta’s own internal documents projected that about 10% of its 2024 revenue (~$16 billion) would come from scam and banned-goods ads — an estimate Meta said was “rough and overly-inclusive.”
Scam ads can be hard to catch because they hide among real links, dwell on trusted platforms, disguise where they lead, and regenerate faster than takedowns, but a few habits lower your risk.

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