Facebook, Google ‘profited from adverts for illegal medicines’, report claims

Facebook and Google have generated profits from advertisements for unregulated health supplements, including products deemed illegal by various national health authorities, in breach of European laws, new research has claimed. Reset Tech, a German-headquartered non-profit with ties to eBay founder and philanthropist Pierre Omidyar, said it has collected more than 352,000 advertisements promoting so-called clickbait cures on Meta’s and Google’s platforms. The policy and research organisation said the adverts constitute a “direct violation” of articles 34 and 35 of the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), “regarding systemic risks to public health and the obligations of Very Large Online Platforms”. In response to questions from The Irish Times last week, Google and Facebook (owned by Meta) said they have strict rules around medical advertisements on their platforms and take swift action to remove content and ban advertisers. READ MORE While there is no Ireland-specific data in the report, both Facebook and Google have their European headquarters in Dublin. Reset Tech has said the adverts have been seen by people across the EU. On Facebook, from which the researchers collected a sample of 350,549 adverts, it said it found “ads and advertising pages” that “impersonate medical doctors and celebrities and misuse the
Read More