INVESTMENT SCAM is one of the highest damaging cybercrime world wide. Facebook / Instagram advertisement are most commonly used for luring victims into investment scams. Letus take an example of Deep Fake video “Sponsored” by Paying some big amount to Facebook.
1,17,401 views of the video has been ‘facilitated’ by facebook who have interest in the investment or finance. The scam starts when user clicks on “Learn More” and starts engaging with scammers who will professionally try to convince regarding the scheme promoted by Finance Minister.
On similar lines, following are the advertisements related to fake investment scam, themed “Stock Investment” which is one of the very high value crime reported across India.
In several investigations across India by Cyber Police, links to Cambodia based scam compounds have been found
Imagine the scammers are sitting in a remote location in front of their computers and they want to reach out to victims across globe. What is the most convenient option?
- Facebook / Instagram
- WhatsApp / Telegram
Investigation Challenge
Whenever a victim comes to Police or calls 1930 helpline of cybercrime, he does not have information about the initial contact.
Investment scam takes days and sometimes months to execute. Since returns are provided initially to the victims, the scheme appears legit. Till the victim realises, the information related to advertisement and link he had clicked on Facebook /Instagram gets disappeared.
Hence, when the FIR is filed or police starts investigation, since link is not available with victim, the Facebook / Instagram component of crime gets missed. This results in missing most critical part of investigation. Entire investigation gets then focused on chasing mule accounts.
How to Investigate Facebook Advertisements?
Whenever a victim comes with a complaint, ask them to do following to get the link to investment scam / initial contact advertiser.
Step 1: Go to victim’s Instagram —> More —> Your Activity —> Ad Activity
This will list all advertisements clicked by victim. Ask from victim estimated date of contact.
If victim does not remember, check WhatsApp / Telegram chat when victim had started first conversation. This will be the date of Instagram Advertisement Click. Repeat similar for Facebook as well if victim says.
Step 2: Facebook LERS Portal
Put a data disclosure request under relevant section in the Facebook Ads Section.
Important!
If the advertisement has been removed from Facebook, ask for facebook profile data which was pushing the advertisement.
Understand the difference between Ad Link and Profile / Content Link
Example of Ad Link: Each Ad will be having a Library ID.
Example of Content Link :
As a best practice, try to investigate on time as these are very high frequency advertisement disappearing fast.
The option of Facebook Ads also accepts the entire URL of Facebook Library.
What to Ask?
While seeking data disclosure from IT Intermediaries, it is recommended to mention data disclosure under Rule (3)(1) j of IT Rules under IT Act. This binds an intermediary in sharing data in 72 hours.
- Advertisement Billing and Payment Information
- Advertisement Reach
- Phone Number associated with the Ad Account
Once data is received from Meta, international investigation or data disclosure may be required for further analysis. Assistance from BharatPol portal of CBI may be taken for same.
IT Intermediaries / Big – Techs owe a higher responsibility to the world and need to keep a vigilance on their platform to safeguard billions of innocent users. create a detailed plagiarism free news story along with 3-4 sub headings and a seo friendly slug. make it in-depth and include all aspects.
