Facebook vows to close ranks with state agencies in fighting online scams

The remarks came as a team from Meta, the company that owns Facebook, held an educational briefing and dialogue session on Wednesday with local media and public sector partners on the issue of online fraud and scams titled “Staying Vigilant Against Fraud and Scam".

Hazelia Margaretha, Meta’s Asia Pacific public policy manager for economic policy, said that online scams were a highly adversarial space which often involved sophisticated, well-funded, and well-connected organised criminal networks.

"As technologies progress, those bad actors are exploiting these new technologies to avoid detection and make the scam look more real," she explained.

As a result, collaboration with the local public and private sectors is required, as is the continued improvement of prevention measures and tools, as well as security systems, she said.

She pointed out that scams go beyond any individual platform as they usually operate across multiple locations and public surfaces and even run offline too.

She then shared Meta's multiple-pronged approaches to protecting commerce and business integrity and keeping Thai communities safe online.

This includes rigorously enforcing policies around fraud and deception, providing tools for people to stay safe on the platform, and using a combination of manual review processes and automated technologies, such as machine learning techniques, to identify content and accounts that violate Meta’s policies.

"Meta is constantly evolving its techniques to keep pace with changing behaviours online,” she said.

“We do not allow scams on our platforms and are fully committed to safeguarding the integrity of our services, dedicating substantial resources and technology solutions to protect our communities from fake accounts and other inauthentic behaviours,” she added.

Margaretha highlighted four key processes in detecting and dealing with any online crime: verification, AI, human review, and reporting.

Verification is the first step, where Meta will prove the users' authenticity while AI detects any possibility of scam and fraud. If the issue contains a sensitive agenda, a human review will investigate in depth, and a report will be generated in which users will be able to indicate which pages Meta should examine or monitor.

"Meta is committed to removing content that purposefully deceives, wilfully misrepresents, or otherwise defrauds or exploits others for money or property in accordance with Meta's Fraud and Deception policy," she said, adding that if page owners fail verification or Meta's reviewers find a policy violation, the account would be removed.

 

Strong partnership needed

Ing Sirikulbordee, Public Policy Facebook Thailand for Meta, said that the social media giant has a zero-tolerance policy for scams and was committed to taking immediate action to remove illegal activities as soon as possible. She strongly encouraged users to report any suspicious activity.

"Over a number of years, Meta has established productive partnerships with the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society, the Royal Thai Police, and many other agencies of the Thai government to work together across several areas, including frauds and scams," she said.

She added that when it comes to scams on Facebook, Meta works closely with the ministry to quickly take action on content reported to the company and to educate its community on how to identify and report this type of harmful content.

Wetang Phuangsup, the DES ministry’s deputy permanent secretary, expressed his appreciation for Meta's assistance.

He revealed that the ministry was currently prioritising frauds and scams, particularly financial and investment scams, through its proactive work to pre-empt issues and build confidence with businesses and investors, which is a key driver for Thailand's digital economy.

“The ministry has been working closely with several partners, including law enforcement, the private sector, and global tech companies such as Meta, to effectively tackle online scams," he said.

 

Growing at an exponential rate

According to Police Colonel Jessada Burinsuchat, Superintendent of the High-Tech Crime Division at the Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau, there are currently 700 scam and fraud cases per day, with 40% involving e-commerce crime.

He pointed out that as the online business and digital economy are growing at an exponential rate, it would be nearly impossible to eliminate all online scams.

The best way to address this issue was to collaborate with all relevant parties, such as Meta, to build a stronger system to monitor and detect all digital spaces.

"We urge the public to exercise extreme caution when engaging in online interactions on any platform, because cybercriminals are constantly evolving and employing increasingly sophisticated techniques to conceal their crimes. To address this issue, we have established a hotline at 1441 where the public can seek assistance or technical advice regarding cybercrime, as well as report it," he said.

 

As part of Meta’s ongoing efforts to help Thais stay vigilant about fraud and scams, Ing said the company is rolling out an educational video series called “Decode Scam” on Meta Thailand’s Facebook country page this week.

The aim, she said, is to educate people on the different types of scams online and provide helpful tips.

"In the coming month, we will unveil the next phase of #StayingSafeOnline where we will collaborate and co-create with local partners and Thai creators to introduce a new set of edutainment materials on this topic in various formats, from short videos to creative illustrations and educational memes, to provide tips and tricks to Thais in a relatable way that will help keep scammers at bay,” she said.

According to Meta's quarterly Community Standards Enforcement Report, it took action against 676 million fake accounts on Facebook globally in the second quarter of 2023, with 98.8% proactively identified and removed via artificial intelligence prior to a user's report. Meta actioned 1.1 billion pieces of spam content in December 2022, 95.3% of which were detected proactively via artificial intelligence.