Scammers are constantly evolving their tactics – and so are we. Every day, criminals use increasingly sophisticated measures to defraud people on our platforms and across the Internet. That’s why we’re announcing new investments in advanced AI, tools for people to spot and avoid scammers, and partnerships with law enforcement and industry peers for offline enforcement.
Here’s a closer look at our progress and what’s next in our fight against scams.
Our Latest Anti-Scam Tools
Across our apps, our systems find and remove malicious accounts. But we know that scammers try to avoid our detection and may not immediately use accounts maliciously. Our teams of experts built new tools to alert you before engaging with something suspicious.
WhatsApp device linking warning: Scammers may try to trick you into linking your WhatsApp account to their device. For example, they may urge you to share your phone number, followed by a device linking code on your WhatsApp or try to trick you into scanning a QR code under false pretenses, which would then link the scammer’s device to your account.
To stay ahead of these tactics, WhatsApp will now alert you when behavioral signals suggest a linking request might be suspicious. These alerts will show you where the request is coming from and warn that it could be a scam, giving you the chance to pause and reconsider before it happens. Visit the WhatsApp Help Center for more ways to stay safe when linking your device on WhatsApp.
Facebook alerts for suspicious friend requests: We are testing new warnings on Facebook to help you navigate suspicious accounts. When you send or receive a request from an account that shows certain signs of suspicious activity, including when you do not have many mutual friends with them or they indicate a different country location in their profile – you’ll see an alert to help you make an informed decision to block or reject suspicious requests.
Expanding advanced scam detection on Messenger: We are rolling out advanced scam detection on Messenger to more countries this month. When a chat with a new contact may contain patterns of common scams like suspicious job offers, we warn you and ask if you’d like to share recent chat messages for an AI scam review. If a potential scam is detected, you will get more information on common scams, and we’ll suggest actions to take including blocking or reporting the suspicious account. Learn more here.
Using AI to Combat Celeb-Bait and Brand Impersonation
Scammers use subtle tricks and deceptive framing that are hard to catch with traditional detection systems. Our experts and specialists in combating scams built advanced AI systems that can analyze multiple signals— such as text, images, and the surrounding context; consequently this assists us in spotting a broader range of more sophisticated scam patterns faster and at scale.
Detecting impersonation: AI offers a new and different means to detect scammers who impersonate celebrities, public figures, or brands. It strengthens our abilities to analyze fake fan sentiment, misleading bios, or associations with public figures or brands. AI can process far more contextual information about public figures, enhancing our ability to catch deceptive impersonations.
Deceptive links and domain impersonation: We use advanced AI to proactively detect and enforce against content that redirects people to webpages designed to mimic legitimate ones. This technology allows us to identify a broader range of deceptive behaviors with higher precision, to protect thousands of brands against impersonation.
Advertiser Verification
We are always working to make our platforms safer for people and businesses. Today, advertisers may be required to verify depending on factors like where they deliver ads and whether they have a history of not following our rules or the type of ads they run are more susceptible to abuse.
We are expanding advertiser verification, to help ensure that verified advertisers drive 90% of our ads revenue by the end of 2026, up from 70% today. It will cover the highest-risk categories, while the remaining 10% will come from low-risk businesses, like your local ice cream shop.The verification process helps promote greater transparency, limiting attempts to misrepresent advertiser identity. It is an important part of our multi-layered approach to help protect people on our apps from scams.
Taking Action Against Scammers
We’re continuing to detect and disrupt sophisticated scam operations, including by working with industry peers and law enforcement around the world. We do this because we know that criminal networks target people regardless of borders and across messaging, dating apps, social media, crypto, and other apps.
We aggressively combat scam activity to protect people and businesses. Last year alone, we removed over 159 million scam ads, 92% of which we took down before anyone reported them. In India, in 2025, we banned more than 12.1 million pieces of ad content for violating our policies against Fraud, Scam, and Deceptive Practices, out of which over 93% were removed proactively.
Additionally, we took down 10.9 million accounts on Facebook and Instagram, associated with criminal scam centers. Throughout these investigations, we have observed growing sophistication in scam operations, and the industrialization of scams continues to grow.
Recently we participated in a major disruption operation with global law enforcement agencies, resulting in Meta investigators disabling over 150,000 accounts associated with scam center networks in Southeast Asia. The operation targeted sophisticated criminal syndicates that exploit digital platforms to perpetrate a variety of scams. These included the impersonation of law enforcement officials to stage fake “digital arrests,” where fraudsters use video calls to coerce victims into paying fictitious fines or transferring their assets, as well as the promotion of fraudulent cryptocurrency investments.
You can learn more about our enforcement against criminal scam centers in our Adversarial Threat Report.
Raising Awareness About Online Safety
Fighting scams requires more than technology and take-downs. It requires education and raising awareness, especially for vulnerable populations. This year we launched the third edition of Meta’s flagship anti-scam “Scam se Bacho” in partnership with the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) and the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI). The year-long campaign featured acclaimed Indian actor Neena Gupta and leading digital creators to help people identify and avoid online scams.
Our work to protect people against scammers is never done. We will continue to invest in new technologies, share updates on our progress on enforcement, and collaborate with partners to ensure a safer experience for everyone across our platforms.
