Meta announced on Tuesday that it has blocked more than 6.8 million Whatsapp accounts this year, as the company fights a wave of criminal activities on the Internet that have received billions of dollars from victims’ savings.

Fraud accounts were often associated with criminal centers throughout Southeast Asia, where multiple activities are carried out at the same time, from false investment in cryptocurrencies to pyramid systems. Meta warned users that these activities often ask targets to pay in advance to receive promising returns or profits. Later, scammers sometimes show their victims how much they have already “won” before asking them to deposit even more money in the fraud, according to the company.

Between January and June, Meta identified many of these accounts in WhatsApp before they could complete their scams, the company said. Meta also announced that it will introduce a new security feature that will alert users when someone who is not on their contact list adds them to a team in WhatsApp.

Meta’s revelations about scams come as US federal authorities warn that people are losing more and more money from more and more sophisticated scams. In March, the Federal Trade Committee said consumers lost more than $ 12.5 billion in scam in 2024, in a 25% increase over the previous year. While the number of reports of fraudulent fraud remained stable, the percentage of people who lost money was increased by double -digit percentage, according to the committee.

Some of the most commonly mentioned scams include scams from false government officials, problems with electronic markets, false business and business opportunities, as well as investment -related scams.

Meta said Tuesday that scammers often try to persuade their victims to use multiple internet platforms in order to prevent technology companies from getting a complete picture of their range.

In one case, Meta and Openai interrupted the operation of a network of accounts connected to a Cambodia -based fraud, which aimed at possible victims with a scooter rental pyramid plan and false cryptocurrencies. The business used Chatgpt to create a link to a chat in Whatsapp, from which users were quickly transferred to the Telegram. From there, according to the company, they were asked to make a “like” video in Tiktok.