Rhode Island sues Meta for allowing scam ads.

Rhode Island has filed a lawsuit against Meta in state court, accusing the company of tolerating rampant scam ads on its social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, and the messaging app WhatsApp. The lawsuit, filed by the Rhode Island Attorney General, alleges that Meta illegally profited by participating in the creation of scam ads. This is the first scam-related lawsuit brought by a U.S. state against Meta, following a similar lawsuit filed by Santa Clara County, California, in May. Rhode Island's complaint cites internal Meta documents disclosed last year. According to these documents, Meta shows users approximately 15 billion "high-risk" scam ads per day, and about 10% of its 2024 revenue came from fraudulent e-commerce, questionable health products, and other prohibited marketing activities. The lawsuit seeks civil penalties for each alleged violation of Rhode Island law, restitution for consumers, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, and a court order requiring Meta to remediate scam ads on its platforms rather than profit from them. Meta said it will defend itself, calling the lawsuit "baseless" and noting that the company regularly cooperates with law enforcement to combat scam networks. A Meta spokesperson said that in the past year alone, Meta has removed more than 159 million scam ads and launched new anti-fraud tools.