Originally published in Svenska Dagbladet by Björn Jeffery, August 27, 2025

Scammers are using Meta’s platforms to defraud small investors. But when SvD asks questions, there is no one willing to answer.

Next door to Ikea and the Ministry of Defence sits what is probably Sweden’s most successful shell company. You likely know them better as Facebook, or Meta as the company is now called.

When they moved into the offices on Malmtorgsgatan in Stockholm in 2018, then-Sweden CEO Sam Rihani told journalists that the meeting rooms had been named after translated Swedish proverbs. Today it seems that few people are having meetings in the room called “Suspect owls in the moss.”

Despite revenue of around 4.1 billion kronor in the Swedish entity Facebook Sweden AB — and numerous scams defrauding Swedes of their money — there is essentially no one reachable at Swedish Meta. And therefore no one willing to take responsibility for what is happening on the company’s platforms in Sweden.

At major tech companies, Sweden is typically folded into a Nordic business area, itself falling under the acronym EMEA — which bundles Europe, the Middle East and all of Africa into a single division. The exception is usually Ireland, where Silicon Valley companies maintain large presences — direct flights between San Francisco and Dublin are one result. It is not Ireland’s innovative capacity the companies are after, but its tax advantages. And as an EU member, it becomes a natural European home.

When SvD tries to reach Meta and its press department, there was accordingly no expectation that CEO Mark Zuckerberg would pick up the phone. But it would be fitting for a billion-kronor company to offer some kind of comment on why scams consistently arise on its platforms. No such comment is forthcoming, other than that the company has spent a lot of money cleaning up various WhatsApp groups.

The cleanup does not appear to have been sufficient. Moa Langemark, consumer protection economist at Finansinspektionen (the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority), told SvD: “There is every reason to direct criticism at Meta, which owns WhatsApp and Facebook. It is obvious that they are not doing enough to keep their platforms clean from this type of criminal activity.”

The criticism is, however, difficult to direct when there is no one in Sweden who intends to receive it.

The situation is, to put it mildly, peculiar. Meta owns the platforms Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Millions of Swedes use them every day. They are the foundation of many companies’ marketing and external communications. Large amounts of money flow through the system. Meta as a whole generated around 464 billion kronor in revenue in 2024. And yet there is no one willing or able to answer questions about the advertisements from scammers that have contributed to that revenue.

Meta’s income is 97 percent advertising purchases. Despite all the investments in AI, the metaverse and VR headsets, it is the advertising business that carries the weight. The scams using well-known Swedish figures like Jacob Wallenberg and Günther Mårder to defraud small investors are therefore contributing to the core business. And more pointedly — the scams need Meta to function. It is through Meta’s platforms that they buy the ads that reach Swedish audiences.

If a company were to buy advertising space on bus shelters claiming that financier Christer Gardell was tipping a particular stock, it would be reasonable to expect the owner of the advertising space to check whether this was true. But when the advertising is digital, this responsibility apparently disappears entirely. The very idea is so absurd that one wonders whether any human being reviewed these advertisements before they were published — or whether it was perhaps an automated AI system.

Whatever the case, the review of advertisements has failed. Many Swedes have been affected.

A frustrated Jacob Wallenberg. Irritation at the Riksbank. And a crisis meeting at Finansinspektionen. The stock market fraud on Facebook and WhatsApp has forced action at the highest levels of Swedish finance.

It is not only financial professionals whose identities are being hijacked to deceive small investors into losing large sums of money. Now Sweden’s most powerful business figures are being drawn into the web of AI-generated clips and fake advertisements.

In recent days, two of the Stockholm Stock Exchange’s most powerful individuals — Investor chairman Jacob Wallenberg and Industrivärden chairman Fredrik Lundberg, as well as Riksbank governor Erik Thedéen — have appeared in video clips on Facebook, owned by Meta with Mark Zuckerberg as CEO.

In the clips, fraudsters make it appear as though the three financial leaders are offering stock tips to viewers. But it is all fabricated.

Jacob Wallenberg has reacted with frustration at the fake clips, according to sources at SvD. He does not wish to comment personally at this stage, but Investor confirms that it has contacted Meta.

“We have the same experience as other parties — it is not entirely easy to get in touch with Meta. But we have noted that the clips have now been removed,” says Jacob Lund, head of communications at Investor.

Whether the company will pursue the matter further, for instance with a police report, remains unclear.

“We note and understand the criticism that Finansinspektionen and the Economic Crime Authority have previously raised — that Meta’s actions to date to remove fraud from its platforms have not been sufficient,” says Jacob Lund.

Lundbergs has also attempted to contact Meta, SvD has learned. There too, getting through to the tech giant has proved difficult.

At Finansinspektionen, the situation is being monitored on a daily basis. On Thursday the authority called a crisis meeting. Around sixty people from affected securities firms attended the hastily convened gathering, including representatives from SEB, Nordea, Swedbank, Avanza and Nordnet.

Riksbank press officer Tomas Lundberg told SvD: “We warned already in the spring that the Riksbank and the governor were appearing in fake videos offering investment opportunities to individuals.” The authority has recently been made aware that the fake clips are still appearing.

“The Riksbank does not offer investment opportunities or other banking services to private individuals,” he added. According to Tomas Lundberg, Meta acted after the Riksbank raised the issue of the fake clips. “But the fact that this type of false information continues to spread shows that it is still a problem — one that Finansinspektionen and the Economic Crime Authority are also raising.”

SvD repeatedly tried to reach Meta’s press department without result. Jan Elvelid, responsible for policy questions at Meta Nordic, has previously referred to earlier statements in which the company says it has invested large sums in cleaning up fraud in WhatsApp groups, and that this work is ongoing.

The stock scams have become increasingly brazen, and many small investors have lost large sums of money.

Four years ago, prosecutor Jonas Myrdal at the Economic Crime Authority ordered a search of premises as part of an investigation in which three people in southern Sweden were arrested on suspicion of serious market manipulation. That case also involved so-called “pump and dump” — where a share price is manipulated using false information and then large sales are made once a certain price level has been reached.

“Back then there was something homemade about the whole thing, sometimes quite amateurish,” says Jonas Myrdal.

“It is of course terrible for those who have been affected. The blame is in no way on them, but it is somewhat alarming that many investors are probably not sufficiently critical and are too easily attracted by promises of quick money,” he says.

Jonas Myrdal, like many others, questions Meta’s engagement in removing scammers from its platforms.

“Something is clearly wrong when scam advertisements can keep appearing again and again. Meta reasonably needs better control over who advertises and opens accounts with them,” says Jonas Myrdal.

Myrdal also directs attention towards the online brokers Avanza and Nordnet. Both have posted warning texts on their websites since the fraud gained media attention, advising customers how to avoid being deceived.

“Both Avanza and Nordnet are keen to highlight how easy it is to trade shares with them, not least foreign ones. That should come with a certain responsibility — for example regarding identifying sharply increased trading volumes and the reason for them,” says Jonas Myrdal.

He adds, however, that what has now happened was difficult to foresee, and that fraud linked to foreign stocks is essentially a new phenomenon in Sweden. “I also think the new fraud illustrates that the widespread public interest in the stock market in Sweden — rightly held up as a model in Europe — also has a dark side. For instance, there is a risk that individuals are tempted into making quick money through risky transactions.”

Johan Tidestad, representing brokerage firms, rejects Myrdal’s criticism. “I believe that the responsibility for overseeing trading in specific stocks lies primarily with the exchanges, not with us as brokers,” he says.