‘Am I losing this battle? Yes’: Martin Lewis on the online scams that steal his identity – and others’ life savings

Martin Lewis says victims have lost more than £20m to deepfake scams using his identity, as the personal finance expert accused the government of failing to enforce laws designed to hold tech platforms accountable for fraudulent advertising [1]. Lewis, the founder of MoneySavingExpert, has campaigned against scam advertising for nearly a decade [1]. He settled a defamation case with Facebook in 2018, with the company donating £3m to Citizens Advice after it published adverts that used his image to market fraudulent investments [1]. Despite the passage of the Online Safety Act in 2023, which makes tech companies responsible for adverts on their platforms, Lewis said implementation has stalled. "Absolutely bugger all has been done," he told the Guardian [1]. Ofcom, the regulator responsible for enforcing the act, said it is developing new rules for paid-for fraudulent ads on the most widely used social media and search services [1]. A 12-week consultation is set to begin in July, with final policy statements due by mid-2027 at the latest [1]. Lewis and the chief executive of Which? wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Keir Starmer in May expressing concern about the government's inaction [1]. Lewis said they have not received a reply [1]. Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook and Instagram, derived 97.8 percent of its total revenue from advertising as of 2023 [7]. Last year, Reuters reported on internal Meta projections showing that approximately 10% of the company's annual revenue in 2024 — or $16bn (£12.1bn) — would come from illicit advertising [1]. Meta said in response that it had reduced user reports of scams by 58% over the previous 18 months [1]. Lewis called the revenue figure evidence of profiting from harm [1]. Action Fraud research from 2024 analysed by MoneySavingExpert suggested Lewis topped the chart of famous faces used in scam adverts, ahead of Taylor Swift and Elon Musk [1]. Lewis described the operations behind the scams as "organised crime" using "psychologically adept marketing systems" [1]. He recounted an encounter with a caretaker who had invested £250 in a fraudulent scheme and argued with Lewis for over 20 minutes before accepting it was a scam [1]. Lewis said he feels "completely let down by the entire political classes" and questioned why victims of scam advertising have not received the same legislative urgency as other online harms [1]. "What is it about the people who have been victims of scammers that you don't consider them, and don't want to help them, and don't feel that they need legislation and proper protection?" he asked [1].