Facebook and Google are failing to take action against fake adverts

Two in five victims of online scam adverts do not report the scam to hosting platforms

Facebook and Google are failing to remove online scam adverts despite being reported by fraud victims, according to a new study by Which?

The group conducted a survey among 2,000 UK adults, in which participants were asked questions about their experiences with fake adverts.

About 15 per cent of the total respondents said they had fallen victim to a scam adverts. However, nearly half of those - 43 per cent - did not report the scam to the platform hosting the ad, either because they believed that the platform would not remove the ad, the process was too time-consuming or they couldn't be bothered.

35 per cent of social media users said they didn't know how to report a fake ad, with the figure rising to more than half (51 per cent) of search engine users.

Although tech giants say they are constantly improving their reporting functions, Which? found that the process of reporting was often complex or not straightforward, citing Google and Twitter as examples. For example, an 'I suspect this is fake or a scam' option is often missing, and users instead have to say that the ad is ‘breaking the platform's rules' or ‘committing a violation'.

When the reporting is both clear and straightforward, as in the case of Facebook, users said they often don't report because they don't expect any action to be taken. That applies to almost a third of Facebook users who had been scammed on the platform.

Which? is now calling for the government to include online scams in its Online Safety Bill. It has also launched a free scam alert service that will help people to familiarise themselves with scammers' most recent tactics.

"Online platforms must be given a legal responsibility to identify, remove and prevent fake and fraudulent content on their sites," said Which? consumer rights expert Adam French.

A Facebook spokesperson told Which? that their platform does not allow fraudulent activity and that the company has taken action on a large number of scam pages.

A Google representative said that their teams constantly review accounts, ads and sites to ensure compliance with Google policies. They added that Google teams have removed or blocked more than 3.1 billion ads.

The survey findings from Which? have come just a week after cyber security firm Human Security's (formerly White Ops) researchers had uncovered and disrupted a large-scale fraud operation, dubbed the Pareto CTV botnet, in which cyber criminals infected more than one million Android mobile devices to steal revenues from unsuspecting advertisers.

The fraudsters served on average 650 million ad requests a day as part of the fraud operation, collecting funds that were meant for apps available on popular streaming-TV platforms run by Roku, Amazon, Google and Apple.

Twenty-nine Android apps, most available on the Google Play market, made infected devices appear to be smart TVs, tricking ad providers into believing that the ad views were genuine, although they were never watched by a real person. The researchers also found 36 apps on Roku to be part of the same fraud campaign.