In today’s Digest, we cover Meta saying scam ads may account for 3–4% of revenue, Google doubling down on AI with a USD$185bn spend plan, and Alibaba’s Qwen topping China’s App Store after a bubble tea campaign.

Meta says scam ads may account for 3–4% of revenue

Meta pushed back against claims that a significant share of its advertising revenue comes from scams during the Advertising Association’s LEAD conference in London. Responding to a November Reuters investigation, which reported that the company had internally estimated it could generate around 10% of its 2024 revenue, roughly USD$16bn (£11.84bn) from ads linked to scams and prohibited products, Meta executive Rima Amin said the figure had been misrepresented.

Speaking to an audience of UK advertising leaders, Amin, Meta’s security policy manager for community defence, said the 10% estimate did not accurately reflect the scale of confirmed scam activity on the platform. Based on Meta’s internal analysis, Amin said genuinely fraudulent advertising may have accounted for closer to 3% to 4% of the company’s total ad revenue in 2024. While acknowledging that the figure remains higher than the company would like, she said Meta expects it to decline in 2025.

Google doubles down on AI 

Google has lifted its spending ambitions as rising advertising and cloud revenues give the company greater financial muscle to accelerate its push into AI. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, said that it now expects capital expenditure in 2026 to reach between USD$175bn (£129.5bn) and USD$185bn (£137bn), an increase that is well above market expectations of roughly USD$120bn (£88.8bn). 

The revised outlook underscores the scale of Google’s AI strategy, which has gathered pace in recent months with the rollout of new Gemini models.

Qwen tops China App Store 

Alibaba Group Holding vaulted to the top of China’s Apple App Store rankings after launching a high-profile giveaway campaign through its artificial intelligence chatbot, Qwen, overtaking rival Tencent Holdings’ Yuanbao within hours.

The app jumped from tenth place the previous day as a rush of users claimed freebies including bubble tea, driving more than 10 million orders in just nine hours.