Facebook 'Knew about Inflated Video Metrics for Years'

Last year, Facebook agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit over the alleged inflation of its video audience metrics by anything up to 900%. An amended filing now claims the firm's execs were aware of its overestimating the number of people advertisers could reach, as far back as 2015.

In 2016, three advertisers sued Facebook after claiming the social media giant had 'induced' them to buy video ads, and at a higher price, by inflating the average time spent watching video ads by between 60% and 80%. Three years later, and following months of negotiations, Facebook owned up to the issue, but said billing would not be affected as decisions to advertise had not been based on the stats in question. The plaintiffs then filed an amendment, stating that documents obtained from Facebook showed that its average viewing metrics had been inflated by a much higher amount - anything from 150% to 900% - and at this point, Facebook agreed to settle the claims, but blamed the issue on a 'calculation error'.

Now, an amended lawsuit filed claims that Facebook had known its metrics were false for several years. According to the FT, in this new filing it is alleged that the 'potential reach' metric for certain US states and demographics, exceeded the population of those states, and therefore could have included fake and duplicate accounts. The plaintiffs have also included in the filing e-mail communications from a Facebook product manager, suggesting that the inflated metric was 'a lawsuit waiting to happen'; with another employee writing: 'How long can we get away with the reach overestimation?' In addition, Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Chief Financial Officer David Wehner were mentioned as having expressed concerns about the issue, but most of their quotes have been redacted.

Facebook says the claims are groundless, and declares that it will be defending itself 'vigorously'.