No rule holding platforms responsible for impersonation scam ads exists yet. What exists is a question. On Sept. 24 the Federal Trade Commission asked the public whether its Impersonation Rule should be updated to reach the websites and apps that carry paid ads and listings, and it opened the earliest formal stage of rulemaking to find out.
An advance notice is the first step, not a rule
The FTC’s press release describes an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, or ANPRM, that seeks comment on whether to update the Rule on Impersonation of Government and Businesses “or take other action.” The Commission wants input on how the ad-optimization tools of digital platforms may be furthering impersonation scams. The vote to issue the notice was 2-0.
An ANPRM comes before any proposed rule text, and a proposal would still have to be published, commented on and finalized before it could bind anyone. Nothing in the notice makes a platform liable for a scam ad today. Christopher Mufarrige, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said in the release: “Free markets depend on trust, transparency and consumers’ ability to make informed choices.”
What the rule already covers
The existing rule is 16 CFR Part 461, promulgated on March 1, 2024 at 89 Fed. Reg. 15017, according to the notice text. The question now is whether that rule, which targets impersonation of government agencies and businesses, should be extended to platforms that promote or host impersonation scams, including search. The matter is filed under number R207000.
The notice defines a platform broadly as public-facing websites or apps on which third parties offer goods, services or opportunities through paid advertisements or other listings. The trade outlet IPWatchdog reported that the proposal discusses Section 230, the federal law protecting sites from liability for merely hosting third-party content, as an affirmative defense against liability of that kind.
The $16 billion and the $195.9 billion, and why they differ
Two large numbers frame the notice, and they measure different things. The first is reported losses: “In 2025, consumers reported losing approximately $16 billion to fraud, a 25% increase compared to 2024,” the notice says. That is money people reported losing. A 25% rise to $16 billion implies roughly $12.8 billion reported the year before ($16 billion divided by 1.25), so the reported total grew by about $3.2 billion in a year.
The second is an adjusted estimate. The notice cites the FTC’s Protecting Older Consumers Report, which estimated that the true cost of fraud in 2024, adjusted for underreporting, may be as high as $195.9 billion. It is an upper-end estimate for a different year and covers fraud generally, not only impersonation scams or scam ads, so the two figures cannot be added or compared as one series.
Imposter scams have their own count in the press release: consumers reported losing nearly $3.5 billion to them in 2025, on more than 1 million reports. Nearly 30% of consumers who lost money to scammers in 2025 were first contacted through social media, with reported losses of $2.1 billion.
The gap between reported and estimated losses is the FTC’s argument for caution in reading any single figure. Reported losses are a floor, since many victims never file a report, and the adjusted estimate is an attempt to correct for that. The notice uses both to explain why the agency is asking about platforms at all, but neither figure measures how much of the loss began with a scam ad.
Who has weighed in so far
The bank lobby Bank Policy Institute said in a statement that it supports the effort and will file comments, saying it wants to “demand greater accountability from platforms where these scams spread and find new victims.” That is one industry’s position at the start of a comment process, not a finding by the FTC.
The release does not name individual platforms, and none is described as having violated the existing rule. Whether the FTC ends up proposing anything, and in what form, is not decided in the notice.
Advance notices of this kind tend to draw comments from consumer groups, platforms, banks and trade associations, and the FTC decides afterward whether to publish an actual proposed rule. That decision would be a separate vote with its own text, and it would open a second comment period.
The comment window has no calendar date yet
Comments close 60 days after the notice is published in the Federal Register, and the FTC’s notice page does not state that publication date. Without it, no closing day can be calculated. Comments are submitted through Regulations.gov, and the Federal Register notice carries the instructions.
For a household, the effect is indirect and far off. A rule, if one ever came, would change who answers for a fake ad, not what a shopper should do when one appears. Until then, the primary record is the FTC’s Sept. 24, 2026 release and the ANPRM it links, which fix the question asked, the two loss figures and the 60-day comment rule.
Scam ads are one route; contact lists are another
The FTC’s question concerns paid ads, but scammers also reach people through calls, texts and emails aimed at numbers and addresses gathered from data brokers and people-search sites. Incogni asks those sites to remove personal information, keeps re-sending the requests, and shows a subscriber the status of each one. Less personal data on broker lists can mean fewer scam calls, texts and emails, which does nothing about ads shown on a platform.
Check the status of broker-site removal requests with Incogni → We may earn a commission if you buy through this link.
This article was written with AI assistance and reviewed against the FTC documents linked above.
