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That $250 Louis Vuitton Advertised on Facebook? Yup, It's Fake

Photo: Louis Vuitton
Photo: Louis Vuitton

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Here's why you should start hiding your credit card when you log onto Facebook: Those $180 Ray-Bans boasting a crazy $30 price tag? Most likely knockoffs, Bloomberg reports, citing a study conducted by "Italian cyber-security experts" Andrea Stroppa and Agostino Specchiarello claiming that 25% of Facebook's luxury and fashion ads hawk counterfeits. Despite Facebook's efforts to identify and remove fraudulent content, the peddling of fake items continues: Out of 1,000 ads, Stroppa and Specchiarello counted 180 luxury and fashion listings. A whopping 45 of the advertised wares were counterfeits, linking to phony websites registered under Chinese front companies. The moral of the story? If it sounds too good to be true, well, it probably is.
· Fakebook: Site Touts Luxury Goods That May Not Be What They Seem [Bloomberg]
· Facebook is Littered with Ads for Luxury Fakes [The Cut]
· Social Media Is Making Women Feel Terrible About Their Bodies [Racked]