WhatsApp has taken down 6.8 million accounts linked to scammers targeting people around the world in the first half of this year, its parent company Meta says.
Many were tied to scam centres run by organised criminals in South East Asia, who often used forced labour in their operations, according to the social media giant.
Meta made the announcement as WhatsApp rolled out new anti-scam measures to alert users to potential fraudulent activity, such as a user being added to a group chat by someone not in their contacts list.
The crackdown targets an increasingly common tactic in which criminals hijack WhatsApp accounts or add users to group chats promoting fake investment schemes and other scams.
Meta said WhatsApp “proactively detected and took down accounts before scam centres were able to operationalise them.”
In one case, WhatsApp worked with Meta and ChatGPT-developer OpenAI to disrupt scams linked to a Cambodian criminal group that offered cash for likes on social media posts to promote a fake rent-a-scooter pyramid scheme.
It said scammers had used ChatGPT to create the instructions issued to potential victims.
Typically, fraudsters would first contact potential targets with a text message before moving the conversation to social media or private messaging apps, said Meta.
These scams were usually completed on payment or cryptocurrency platforms, it added.
“There is always a catch and it should be a red flag for everyone: you have to pay upfront to get promised returns or earnings.”
UK consumer rights organisation Which? welcomed the announcement, but said: “Meta must do much more to stop these criminals across all its platforms.”
Consumer law expert Lisa Webb added: “Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp users are being inundated with fraudulent ads for everything from fake investment opportunities to dodgy products and non-existent job offers.
“Meta needs to ensure that scams are prevented from ever appearing on its platforms in the first place.”
“Meta needs to ensure that scams are prevented from ever appearing on its platforms in the first place. Ofcom must now take action to enforce the parts of the Online Safety Act already in effect, and to issue robust rules governing fraudulent paid-for ads, so that tech firms are forced to take full responsibility for the content on their sites.”
Scam centres that cheat people out of billions of dollars are known to operate from South East Asian countries like Myanmar, Cambodia and Thailand.
These centres are also known to recruit people who are then forced to carry out the scams.
Authorities in the region have urged people to be wary of potential fraud and use anti-scam measures such as WhatsApp’s two-step verification feature to help protect their accounts from being hijacked.
In Singapore, for example, users have also been told by police to be wary of any unusual requests they receive on messaging apps.