Meta

Facebook and Instagram are paradises for scammers, reveal Meta’s internal documents

Reuters shed light on Meta’s lucrative business built on selling fraudulent ads on its platforms — Facebook and Instagram. Internal company documents obtained by the news agency show that 10.1% of Meta’s 2024 revenue, or US$ 16 billion, came from fraudulent/scam ads.

A December 2024 document shows Meta running an average of 15 billion fraudulent ads per day. Those add to 22 billion pieces of suspicious “organic” content (unpaid) — from hacked profiles offering crypto schemes to promises of miracle cures in groups, and fake listings on Facebook Marketplace.

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Revisiting Facebook

In March, in a rare moment of sobriety from the artificial intelligence drug, a revamped Mark Zuckerberg — gold chain around his neck, wild hair — promised that Facebook, or at least part of it, would return to simpler times, when the social network was… well, a social network. An innocent era when he himself looked like a wax figure rather than a wannabe rapper.

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A less affectionate approach to technology

It’s almost impossible to escape WhatsApp and very difficult to get rid of Instagram. For many, it’s also undesirable. Friends, relatives, loved ones, and the entire presence of many businesses are only available on one or the other (or both).

In 2022, when I wrote about a “more affectionate approach” to technology (pt_BR), I had recently returned to using these and other commercial platforms. I lowered my defenses in an attempt to be more present, to participate more.

The problem with companies like Meta is that every concession on our part is exploited to the fullest.

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This option disables Meta AI and increases privacy in WhatsApp conversations

Remember when WhatsApp was just a lightweight messaging app? I miss those days. Today there are so many features, so many announcements of new stuff that sometimes useful ones slip by unnoticed.

By chance, the other day I came across “Advanced chat privacy,” available in group and individual conversations. It was released in April.

When activated, three things happen:

  • It disables conversation export. This makes it harder to forward messages to third parties and process them with external AIs, like Google’s NotebookLM.
  • It disables automatic media downloads.
  • Finally, it disables access to Meta AI, Meta’s annoying AI that, by default, can be invoked by typing @meta in a conversation.

Unfortunately (but not surprisingly), there isn’t a global button to activate advanced privacy in all conversations; only within each conversation’s options.

Given the impossibility of using a better app, like Signal, it’s a good option to activate when sensitive topics are being discussed.

Between Meta announcing that its AI, Meta AI, reached 1 billion users and Google saying that AI Overviews are used by 1.5 billion, I’m curious to know how many of these people intentionally use the feature, or prefer it to what the AI replaces.

AI Overviews appear at the top of searches, with no option to turn them off. Meta AI, I suspect many people trigger accidentally by tapping that horrible button in WhatsApp, in search results across its three core apps, or when trying to tag someone in a group by typing an @ symbol.

It’s very easy to reach enormous numbers when you already have a giant platform. I don’t think that’s even part of the discussion. The issue is trumpeting these numbers as if they were earned, rather than imposed.

The trial that can break Instagram and WhatsApp from Meta

Antitrust trials in US courts may be the country’s greatest contribution to humanity after eggs benedict and the golden age of Hollywood.

On Monday (14th), one of the most anticipated trials in recent times began, in which the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) accuses Meta of monopolizing the personal social networking market by blocking potential competitors through its billion-dollar acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. One possible remedy is the breakup of the company, restoring Instagram and WhatsApp as independent alternatives and rivals to Facebook.

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Instagram no Longer Allows People Without an Account to View Photos and Videos on Computers

Instagram raised the wall that separates people who do not have an account from those who do. Since at least April 21st, Instagram doesn’t allow unregistered people to view photos and videos from public profiles on computers and tablets.

Public profiles, those that don’t have the padlock that restricts content to registered followers, have always been accessible regardless of login. Not anymore.

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