Meta’s “neutral infrastructure” defense just hit a wall in Germany. On September 16, 2026, the Frankfurt Regional Court ruled that running a paid ad auction is not passive hosting—it is editorial control. The decision came in case 2-06 O 234/25, brought by Finflow GmbH, the company behind finance brand Finanzfluss, and co-founder Thomas Kehl.
Fake ads, real liability
Fraudsters created fake Facebook and Instagram accounts impersonating Finanzfluss and Kehl, using his photos in paid ads that pushed users into WhatsApp groups promoting fraudulent investments. The team logged roughly 256 violations between July 29 and August 28, 2024. Reported fake profiles took 14 to 20 days to come down, and a deepfake video ad ran for 13 days and reached more than 5,000 users.
Meta argued it was protected as a hosting provider under Article 6 of the Digital Services Act. The court rejected that. Applying the CJEU’s Webgroup and Coyote ruling, the chamber wrote that operating an auction gives the platform “a control and decision-making function over the advertisements that is superior to that of the individual advertiser.”
Meta’s other defenses also failed: neutral infrastructure, technical impossibility of detecting variations, advertiser-controlled targeting, and the claim that Finanzfluss is generic. None survived.
The penalty that changes the math
The court ordered Meta to stop distributing impersonating content and content using Finanzfluss’s or Kehl’s likeness, hand over URL-sorted data on reach and revenue from the fake ads, and pay €3,568.81 in pre-trial legal costs. The headline is enforcement: up to €250,000 for each future breach of the injunctions.
Why the reasoning travels
Google Ads, Amazon Ads, TikTok and Microsoft Advertising all run ranked auctions with quality scores, eligibility filters and bid decisions. If those choices count as editorial control, the hosting exemption shrinks to services that simply present content chronologically and sell nothing against it. Meta may appeal, and the issue could eventually reach Luxembourg. But the practical signal is clear: platform control now has a price tag.
Scale supplies the context. Reuters reported in November 2025 that Meta had internally projected roughly €16 billion in revenue from scam and banned-goods advertising. Meta says it removed 134 million scam ads during 2025 and banned 3.5 billion fake accounts. Both can be true: a platform can remove huge volumes and still profit from what slips through. The Frankfurt order for reach and revenue data is designed to test that.
Action plan for brands
Impersonation victims rarely have Finanzfluss’s resources. It has about 1.5 million YouTube subscribers and more than 600,000 Instagram followers. For everyone else, document everything early.
- Monitor brand, founder and product impersonation across Meta, TikTok and LinkedIn continuously.
- Log every takedown request with timestamps, account handles and platform responses.
- Record ad reach estimates and user loss signals where possible.
- Escalate repeat infringements through legal counsel, not just in-platform forms.
Source: PPC Land
