Fake Political Content Surges on Social Media as Canadian Election Approaches

A quarter of Canadians have encountered sophisticated fake political content on social media as the country approaches its April 28 federal election, according to a report released Friday by Canada’s Media Ecosystem Observatory (MEO). Researchers warn that platforms must strengthen protections against the “dramatic acceleration” of online disinformation in the final weeks of campaigning.

The report reveals a growing number of Facebook advertisements impersonating legitimate news sources while actually promoting fraudulent investment schemes, often involving cryptocurrency. This election marks the first national vote where Canadian news cannot be shared on Meta-owned platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, following a ban implemented in August 2023.

The ban resulted from a standoff between Meta and the Canadian government over the Online News Act, which requires tech intermediaries like Meta and Google’s parent company Alphabet to compensate journalism outlets for sharing their content. Meta described the legislation as “unworkable” and opted to end news availability in Canada rather than comply with the compensation requirements.

Despite the news ban, researchers found that more than half of Canadians still rely on Facebook for political information. “People using Facebook aren’t often thinking, ‘Am I reading the news?’ But they leave feeling more informed politically,” explained Aengus Bridgman, MEO’s executive director. “But we know this is not the same quality of information they might have accessed before the ban. The richest, densest and most accurate and factchecked information is not making it through anymore.”

The investigation uncovered more than 40 Facebook pages promoting fraudulent advertisements, with new pages appearing daily. While most content was designed to be humorous or ironic rather than convincing, and researchers don’t expect it to significantly influence voters, the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (Site) taskforce continues monitoring for disinformation. The taskforce has identified China, Russia, and Iran as the greatest threats to Canada’s electoral process.

Recently, Site officials detected an information operation linked to China on WeChat, specifically through a news account called Youli-Youmian. However, Bridgman downplayed its impact, stating, “We don’t think one WeChat channel posting a couple times about Canadian politics articles consistent with their editorial line amounts to foreign interference.”

Of greater concern to researchers are sophisticated scams involving “fake sensational political headlines” that impersonate legitimate news sources. The report identified seven deepfake videos falsely showing Prime Minister Mark Carney promoting fraudulent investment platforms, typically mimicking broadcasts by major news outlets CBC or CTV.

One example featured a headline reading “Mark Carney announces controversial retaliatory tariff plan in response to Trump’s devastating tariff hikes this week,” with a fabricated interview transcript promising financial benefits to Canadians who register for a purported government program. The link directed users to a cryptocurrency scam.

Another scam involved a page called “Money Mindset” using CBC/Radio-Canada’s logo to run five French-language Facebook ads between April 4-9. One ad featuring a deepfake of Carney cost approximately C$500 and received 5,000-6,000 impressions. In total, these five ads represented an investment of about C$1,000 and reached around 10,000 users.

“These imposter ads, fake news articles, and deepfake videos can undermine the credibility of both the targeted party leaders featured in the content and the news brands and journalists whose names, logos, or visual designs are being impersonated,” the report stated.

A Meta spokesperson responded that running ads that scam or impersonate people or brands violates company policies, adding that they encourage users to report fraudulent content. “This is an ongoing industry-wide challenge – scammers use every platform available to them and constantly adapt to evade enforcement. Our work in this area is never done.”

However, researchers criticized tech companies’ responses as “inconsistent and insufficient” given the continued proliferation of such ads. They also noted that since many of these ads don’t self-identify as political, they often don’t appear in Meta’s ad library, making it difficult to assess the full scope of the problem.

Bridgman expressed frustration with the situation: “Imagine that on TV there’s an ad using clearly fraudulent content or is a deepfake. In what world would that be allowed? It would never get approved for use because of the advertising standards in this country. And yet, Facebook runs these ads that get hundreds of thousands of views across the country and it’s just a pure scam. This feels like we’re kind of in a Black Mirror moment.”