Abstract:
Research shows that 73 of the top 100 Meta content creators in Temu are fake accounts and the content they publish is generated by artificial intelligence. A woman suddenly appears on the beach, wiping strangers' grimy arms with bathing gloves and telling viewers they're not cleaning the way they're doing. The video has been viewed more than a billion times and the woman almost certainly does not exist.
The video’s creator, “Ya Lily,” has 183,000 followers on Instagram and 129,000 on Facebook, where she posts under a completely different name, with a bio that reads: “You are my death dream.”
A study shared with Fortune by the Czech nonprofit Online Risk Labs (ORL) found that over a 16-month period, her content ran in more than 109,500 of Temu's ad campaigns, averaging about 225 per day and more than 1 billion views.
Yes, Lily is not alone.
ORL's analysis of Temu's top 100 Meta content creators found that 73 of them are likely fake accounts, and although the target audience is European users, 28 of these accounts are located in Russia and 19 in China.
73% of users changed their account name at least once during the study period; one person changed their account name 15 times.
Only eight creators have been identified. ORL manager Vendula Prokůpková told Fortune that she believes true creators only make up 15 to 20 percent of the group.
Stuart Lester, who leads the advertising and marketing team at law firm Mishcon de Reya, said creating fake accounts to advertise was "misleading in many respects" and could breach the UK's Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Act and EU advertising rules.
ORL has submitted a report asking the EU Digital Services Act regulator to formally assess the risks posed by Temu's creator network.
The scale is staggering: Partnership ads accounted for 65.8% of all Meta ads on Temu during this period, compared with about 2% for the average advertiser.
ORL estimates Temu spent $962 million on this ad format in the UK and EU, accounting for almost 2% of total revenue in the given quarter in Europe.
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