Facebook Comes Under Scanner for False Climate Ads

Facebook Comes Under Scanner for False Climate Ads
A woman holds a smartphone with the Facebook logo in front of a displayed Facebook's new rebrand logo Meta in this illustration picture taken on Oct. 28, 2021. Dado Ruvic/Illustration/Reuters
Benzinga
Updated:

Facebook rebranded Meta Platforms Inc. advertisers promoted false and misleading claims about climate change on the platform in recent weeks, just as the COP26 conference was getting underway, Reuters reports.

The conservative media network Newsmax ran an ad on Facebook that called the man-made global warming a “hoax.” The ad, which had multiple versions, garnered over 200,000 views.

In another, conservative commentator Candace Owens said, “apparently we’re just supposed to trust our new authoritarian government” on climate science, while a U.S. libertarian think-tank ran an ad on how “modern doomsayers” had been wrongly predicting climate crises for decades.

Facebook faced immense flak as a whistleblower testified to the Senate how Facebook puts “profits before people.”

Price Action

FB shares traded higher by 0.59 percent at $338.78 on the last check Thursday.
By Anusuya Lahiri