Why Facebook is allowing fake and scam shops to run ads?
I have been noticing lots of ads on Facebook where recently created Facebook pages are selling T-shirts.
There were ads from a recently created Game of Thrones page selling GoT quoted T-shirt, there are persistent ads from some ‘Linux pages’ that do nothing but sell quotes t-shirt on third party stores.
Until now this was bearable. But then I saw a strange ad today.
It was from the reputed clothing brand Ralph Lauren. As per the ad, Ralph Lauren France was selling its Polo t-shirts at 90% discount.
I was intrigued so I checked the page. Apparently, the page was created 3 days back and had less than 50 likes.
Most interesting thing is that it was listed as non-profit organization (and selling things at the same time).
I clicked on the Shop Now button to check where does it go. The link pointed to ralphlauren[dot]ga domain which had a e-commerce front end.
I googled for Ralph Lauren France and found that they have an existing website called ralphlauren[dot]fr.
Now I wonder how come Facebook ads allowed it to run. It’s a counterfeit product, no doubt. It’s like selling Nikea shoes.
I as a tech aware person was alert but what about the unsuspecting people who might have actually bought the stuff?
What if the phony website stored credit card details?
I do believe that Facebook must be more strict about what kind of ads are being run on its platform.
What do you think?