Meta worked with the DOJ, along with Microsoft, Coinbase, Starlink, and international law enforcement agencies to expose online scams and identify the criminal syndicates behind them. The company is facing a lot of criticism for allowing scammers to run freely on its platform. Then Billions of dollars are reportedly being made annually from advertising marketing scams. This special operation focuses on criminal networks operating out of Southeast Asia that target Americans with romance scams, “pig slaughter” schemes, and law enforcement impersonation. They also provide fake jobs to fellow Southeast Asians, who find themselves forced to work in scam premises.
Throughout the week beginning on May 18, Meta, along with Microsoft, Coinbase, Starlink, the Department of Justice, the Royal Thai Police, and other law enforcement partners from the UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, met in Washington, DC to share insights. This helped them “connect the dots between disparate pieces of information across all platforms”. Meta says it was the first effort of its kind to involve collaboration between companies across the industry.
Thanks to this operation, Meta was able to identify and disable more than 1.4 million accounts, pages and groups from Facebook and Instagram. Microsoft suspended 20,000 accounts used by scammers, while Coinbase froze more than $3 million worth of cryptocurrencies linked to the criminal network. Meanwhile, Starlink disconnected thousands of kits it discovered were being used by scammers. By exchanging information, they were also able to identify additional potential scam hub locations, and law enforcement agencies have arrested 63 suspects so far.
Although they did not reveal their next steps, Meta said, “The partnering companies are committed to continuing this important collaboration to protect people online.” Meta has been trying to stop scammers for years and once shut down over 2 million accounts linked to pig slaughter schemes, in which bad actors fool victims into making crypto investments (or similar schemes) and make their funds disappear.
As someone who has personally reported obvious scams and been repeatedly told by Meta that it has not removed questionable pages and accounts, I would say the criticisms of the company are justified. As stated, Meta is stepping up its action against deceptive schemes and fraudulent activities. It removed 159 million scam ads and 10.9 million Facebook and Instagram accounts linked to criminal scam centers during 2025. The company also sued advertisers in Brazil and China over fraudulent ads that used deepfake images of celebrities to lure people to fraudulent websites. This March, Meta also launched AI tools to identify brand and celebrity impersonators, as well as issue alerts to warn users if they are communicating with potentially fraudulent accounts.
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