Facebook, along with other tech giants, has been trying to curb the spread of Coronavirus-related fake news on the internet. As part of its efforts, the social network blocked deceptive Coronavirus-related ads on its platform.
However, as it happens every time, malicious minds manage to find a way to satisfy their evil agenda. According to a Reuters report, Facebook has sued a Bangkok-based Indian man Basant Gajjar for creating and selling software that allegedly bypasses Facebook’s ad review systems.
The lawsuit has been filed in a US district court in San Francisco, California, where the company is headquartered. The software was created by an unregistered company called LeadClock, which is owned by Gajjar. It uses a technique known as “cloaking,” and masquerades the actual content of a Facebook ad posting.
Thus, the software is able to trick Facebook’s ad review system into believing that the advertisement being posted is about something else. Whereas, in reality, the ads were used to promote coronavirus misinformation, cryptocurrency scams, and other things.
According to Facebook, LeadCloak has been providing its services since 2016, and also targeted other companies including Google, WordPress, Oath, etc. Nonetheless, this is yet another crackdown from a company that’s often the first to come under fire regarding matters of privacy, security, and fake news.
