10月22日 - 罗德岛州周四在州法院起诉Meta Platforms公司，指控该公司涉嫌纵容其Facebook、Instagram和WhatsApp平台上泛滥的诈骗广告。
Oct 22 - Rhode Island sued Meta Platforms in state court on Thursday over the company's alleged tolerance for widespread scam advertising on its Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp platforms.
罗德岛州总检察长彼得·内罗哈在普罗维登斯高等法院提起的诉讼指控Meta非法从诈骗广告中获利并参与创造了数十亿美元的诈骗广告收入——即使它曾向数十亿用户保证正在努力保护他们。
The suit, filed by Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha in Providence Superior Court, accuses Meta of unlawfully profiting from and participating in the creation of billions of dollars in scam advertising – even as it assured its billions of users that it was working diligently to protect them.
这是美国各州针对Meta提起的首起此类诈骗相关诉讼，此前加利福尼亚州圣克拉拉县于5月提起了类似诉讼。
It is the first such scams-related case to be brought against Meta by a US state, following a similar lawsuit filed in May by California's Santa Clara County.
该诉讼要求对Meta涉嫌违反罗德岛州法律的每一项行为处以民事罚款，要求赔偿消费者、没收非法所得，并寻求法院命令要求该公司解决而非从其开发和投放的诈骗广告中获利。
The lawsuit seeks monetary civil penalties for each of Meta's alleged violations of Rhode Island state law, restitution to consumers, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains and a judicial order requiring the company to address, rather than profit from, scam ads it develops and delivers on its platforms.
内罗哈在新闻稿中说：“据指控，Meta明知故犯地让弱势用户暴露于欺诈和诈骗之中，并从中获取巨额利润。当公司（无论大小）利用罗德岛州消费者时，本办公室将尽其职权所能追究其责任。”
"As alleged, Meta knowingly exposed vulnerable users to fraud and scams, and made enormous profits in doing so. When companies, big or small, take advantage of Rhode Island consumers, this office will do everything within our authority to hold them to account," Neronha said in a press release.
诉讼引用了路透社去年的报道，该报道披露了Meta内部文件，概述了其平台上欺诈性广告的巨大规模——以及Meta的核算显示，其从高风险诈骗广告中获得的收益远超预期因允许这些广告而需支付的罚款。
The suit cites Reuters reporting from last year on internal Meta documents outlining the vast scale of fraudulent advertising on the company's platforms – and Meta's calculations that it was earning far more from high-risk scam ads than it expected to pay in fines for allowing them.
根据这些文件，Meta每天向用户展示约150亿条“高风险”诈骗广告，并从欺诈性电商、可疑健康产品和其他被禁止的营销中获得了约占其2024年收入10%的收益。
According to those documents, Meta displays around 15 billion "higher risk" scam ads to users every day, and earned roughly 10% of its 2024 revenue from fraudulent e-commerce, dubious health products and other banned marketing.
罗德岛州的起诉书指称，在许多情况下，Meta 的 AI 广告创建工具主动协助诈骗者进行欺诈性营销。起诉书指称，Meta 并非始终如一地屏蔽其自动检测系统判定涉嫌欺诈的广告主，有时反而向他们收取额外费用作为惩罚。
In many cases, Rhode Island's suit alleged, Meta's AI ad creation tools actively assisted scammers with their fraudulent marketing. Rather than consistently blocking advertisers that its automated detection systems suspected of fraud, Rhode Island alleged, Meta sometimes charged them extra as a penalty.
起诉书称：“Meta 明知故犯地协助创建并优化这些广告，以确保其尽可能有效，随后却对此撒谎，向公众虚假陈述其致力于防止平台上发生欺诈的承诺。”
"Meta knowingly helped create and optimize these ads to ensure that they were as effective as possible and then lied about them, misrepresenting to the public its commitment to prevent fraud on its platforms," the suit stated.
Meta 未立即回应就该案件置评的请求。该公司此前曾对路透社的报道提出异议。
Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the case. The company has disputed the Reuters reporting.
针对去年的报道，Meta 发言人安迪·斯通（Andy Stone）表示：“我们积极打击欺诈和诈骗，因为我们平台上的用户不想要这些内容，合法广告主不想要，我们也不想要。”他称该报道“只呈现了选择性的观点，扭曲了 Meta 打击欺诈和诈骗的做法”。自路透社发表相关报道以来几个月里，Meta 声称在反诈骗举措方面取得了进展。但罗德岛州指称，诈骗依然猖獗，且在该公司的广告库——一个记录在 Meta 平台投放广告的数据库——中随处可寻。
"We aggressively fight fraud and scams because people on our platforms don't want this content, legitimate advertisers don't want it and we don't want it either," Meta spokesman Andy Stone said in response to the reporting last year, calling it "a selective view that distorts Meta's approach to fraud and scams." In the months since Reuters published the stories, Meta has claimed progress on anti-scam initiatives. But Rhode Island alleged that scams remain rampant and readily findable in the company's ad library, a database of ads run on Meta's platforms.
起诉书以一组诈骗广告为例称：“例如，下面这条广告承诺在 45 天内逆转阿尔茨海默症。仅这一条广告就在 Meta 广告库中就有 2000 多个版本处于投放状态。”
"The ad below, for example, promised to reverse Alzheimer's in 45 days," Rhode Island's complaint stated of one set of scam ads. "There were more than 2,000 versions of this ad active in the Meta Ad library."
瞄准老年人 罗德岛州指称，这些欺诈性广告往往以老年人为目标，并引用了非营利组织“反击数字仇恨中心”（Center for Countering Digital Hate）的一项调查，该调查在 Meta 平台上识别出近 9.4 万条诈骗广告。
TARGETING THE ELDERLY Often the fraudulent ads targeted elderly people, Rhode Island alleged, citing an investigation by the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate, which identified nearly 94,000 scam ads on Meta's platforms.
起诉书称：“其中一些广告主在数年期间在 Meta 广告上的支出，超过了沃尔玛或辉瑞等大品牌。”
"Some of these advertisers spent more on Meta ads over a several year period than large brands like Walmart or Pfizer," the lawsuit stated.
除了诈骗广告，罗德岛州检察长办公室表示，发现 Meta 同样未能监管其他类型的非法广告，例如用于制作深度伪造色情内容的 AI 应用广告。州政府提供的一个例子显示，某广告并排展示了一张穿着整齐的女性在咖啡店的照片，以及一张该女性从事性行为的图片。
Beyond scams, the Rhode Island attorney general's office said it found that Meta was similarly failing to police other types of illicit ads, such as for AI apps for deepfake pornography. In one example provided by the state, an ad featured side-by-side images of a fully clothed woman in a coffee shop next to an image of her engaged in a sex act.
罗德岛州还列举了冒充公众人物和银行等受信机构的诈骗广告案例，利用这些实体的公信力实施欺诈，其中包括一个案例：中国的诈骗分子在 Facebook 和 Instagram 广告中使用美国银行一位高级主管的姓名和照片，诱骗用户在 WhatsApp 上进行诈骗性股票交易。
Rhode Island also cited examples of scam ads impersonating public figures and trusted institutions like banks to leverage their credibility, including a case in which scammers in China used the name and image of a senior Bank of America executive in ads on Facebook and Instagram that lured users into scam stock trades on WhatsApp.
罗德岛州引用的公众调查数据——以及路透社获得的 Meta 内部评估——显示，该公司平台承担了不成比例的在线诈骗份额，且 Meta 的反诈骗防御措施弱于其主要数字广告竞争对手。
Public survey data cited by Rhode Island – and Meta's own internal appraisals obtained by Reuters – indicate that the company's platforms are responsible for a disproportionate share of online scams and that Meta's scam defenses were weaker than those of its main digital advertising competitors.
一份 2025 年 4 月的 Meta 内部审查得出结论：“在 Meta 平台上发布诈骗广告比在 Google 上更容易。”
"It is easier to advertise scams on Meta platforms than Google," concluded an internal Meta review in April 2025.
罗德岛州称，Meta 尽管如此仍试图挫败要求实名认证的监管努力。
Meta nonetheless sought to defeat regulatory efforts to require verification, Rhode Island said.
起诉书指出：“被封禁的广告主只需提供一个新的电子邮件地址或电话号码，就能在极短时间内重新出现。”
The lawsuit stated that "a banned advertiser can reappear in the time it takes to provide a new email address or phone number."