Whistleblower Says Meta Inflated Shops Ads Metrics to Lure Marketers

Meta Platforms is facing fresh scrutiny after a whistleblower told the London Central Employment Tribunal that the company deliberately overstated the performance of its “Shops” e-commerce ads to win marketing budgets and offset the fallout from Apple’s 2021 privacy changes. In a complaint filed on 20 August, former product manager Samujjal Purkayastha alleges that internal data scientists found return on ad spend for Shops ads was inflated by 17%-19% because Meta counted shipping fees and taxes as revenue—figures excluded from its other ad products and from rival platforms such as Google. The filing also says Meta subsidised bids in advertising auctions by up to 100% and applied undisclosed discounts, boosting the likelihood that Shops ads would win placement and appear to outperform conventional campaigns. Purkayastha contends these tactics misled advertisers at a time when Meta executives were seeking “resilient revenue” to compensate for an estimated $10 billion hit from Apple’s App Tracking Transparency rules. Purkayastha further claims Meta introduced a tracking system, AEM2, that linked user activity to third-party sites in ways that bypassed Apple’s privacy framework. He is seeking interim relief that would reinstate his job. Meta has not yet responded publicly to the allegations.