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Meta ran thousands of pornbait ads for fraudulent networks that monetize with Google
Nothing says "healthy online advertising ecosystem" like deceptive ads on one platform being used to drive traffic to deceptive ads on another platform
Alexios Mantzarlis
May 21, 2025
Hey, in case you’re wondering what on earth “Indicator” is and how it ended up in your inbox, this is the new home for Faked Up. On a typical week, Indicator will publish on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Our first two pieces of the week will be paywalled original articles; our Friday article will be a totally free roundup of news and tools on the digital deception beat. Hope you find Indicator valuable!
“HURRY UP WATCH IT BEFORE IT IS DELETED” beckons a Facebook post featuring a blonde woman. Another one invites users to “just click on any word related to Divorce Lawyer 😘” to download an explicit video that is previewed in the post.
These are just two of 3,506 pornbait ads that Indicator found running on Meta. Clicking through didn’t actually lead to pornographic websites, however. Instead, users were directed to a confusing array of websites with Google-run ads camouflaged as search options.
Meta doesn’t share full metrics on ad reach. But company transparency data for the assets that targeted EU citizens suggests the pornbait may have been viewed anywhere from 50,000 to 20 million times. Meta deleted all of the assets I found and the related pages after we reached out for comment. A company spokesperson told Indicator that the ads violated its Adult Sexual Solicitation policy.
The advertising blitz appears to have been at least somewhat effective: According to Similarweb, 83 percent of the monthly traffic to one of the websites being promoted came from Facebook.
The ads typically showed scantily dressed women accompanied by text that promised an explicit live camera show or a downloadable video. A few ads featured short pornographic clips overlaid with text.
The assets were often pictures stolen from the web, as in the post below where an ad calling on users to watch the “uncen++” movie “before it is deleted” was using an image from a photoshoot of K-Pop star Goeun, of the group Laysha.
