Billions from fraud go to social networking sites. The terrifying scale of the practice in Poland and Europe

Social media platforms earn billions from scam advertisements, putting profits ahead of user safety, warns Revolut, based on a Juniper Research report. In Poland alone, revenues from fraudulent content reached PLN 725 million in 2025, and every tenth advertisement in Europe is a fraud attempt.

The latest expert opinions of Juniper Research analysts, commissioned by Revolut, provide hard evidence of a deep ethical crisis in the business model of social media platforms. The report shows that technology giants currently operate in conditions of permanent conflict of interests. Financial benefits of providing advertising space for illegal content, i.e. the so-called hosting, are many times higher than the expenditure these companies spend on fighting fraud and content moderation. As a result, the fight against online crime becomes simply unprofitable for platforms.

The scale of the phenomenon on a continental scale is staggering. It is estimated that social media platforms generate approximately PLN 18.7 billion annually from fraud advertising targeted at European consumers. Data for 2025 show that approximately 10% of the total advertising revenues of these websites in Europe come directly from criminals' budgets. This means that every tenth zloty earned on advertising by the largest market players may be related to fraud and extortion attempts.

Poles encounter 127 scam advertisements every month

Poland has become an extremely lucrative area of ​​operation for cybercriminals – it is responsible for nearly 4% of total European revenues from scams. Although we are inferior in this respect to powers such as Great Britain (11%), Germany (10%) or France (10%), the growth dynamics in our country is alarming. Since 2022, revenue from fraud advertising in Poland has increased by approximately 58%, jumping from PLN 459 million to PLN 725 million annually.

An average Polish social media user currently encounters an average of 127 scam advertisements every month. On a nationwide scale, this translates into an unimaginable number of 33 billion views of fraudulent messages per year. Although the share of scams in the Polish advertising space is slightly lower than the European average and amounts to 6.6%, the upward trend leaves no doubt as to the direction in which the industry is heading.

Big tech companies will earn PLN 43 billion from scams in 2030

Unless the content verification model undergoes a radical shift from reactive to proactive, Juniper Research's predictions for 2030 are alarming. Analysts predict that in four years, social media platforms may earn over PLN 43 billion from fraud advertising in Europe, of which PLN 1.6 billion will fall on the Polish market alone. The number of “scam” views over the Vistula River may increase to 54 billion per year, which means that each of us will be attacked with such content over 30% more often than currently.

The long-term effects of this state of affairs go beyond direct financial losses. Experts warn of the ongoing erosion of consumer trust, which will ultimately lead to a decline in the value of the platforms themselves. Currently, the main beneficiaries of the global fraud industry are – apart from the criminal organizations themselves – social media owners. The costs of this practice are borne solely by the victims: robbed consumers, public figures whose image is illegally used, and law enforcement agencies overwhelmed by the growing wave of reports.

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