Scam ads aimed at Medicare beneficiaries reached 215 million impressions on Meta’s platforms in a single year, nearly six times the total of every earlier year on record, according to a May report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate. Medicare’s open enrollment period runs through Dec. 7, the stretch when plan advertising is heaviest and a fake offer is easiest to mistake for a real one.
The group says the ads brought in an estimated $14.3 million for Meta. It counted the impressions from March 12, 2025 through March 11, 2026.
Why the Dec. 7 date matters
Medicare.gov says the open enrollment period runs October 15 to December 7. During it, a person can join, drop or switch a Medicare Advantage plan, with or without drug coverage, or switch between Original Medicare and a Medicare Advantage plan. The plan must receive the request by Dec. 7, and coverage starts Jan. 1 of the next year.
The deadline is what scammers lean on. An ad promising an allowance card for groceries, rent and gas, or a bigger benefit for switching today, is built to rush a decision. The Center’s report gives one example, a Facebook ad that used a deepfake of Oprah Winfrey to promise such a card. Real plan benefits are listed on the plan’s own pages, and nobody has to act within minutes.
Anyone on Medicare who has seen a social media ad, text or call about a better plan this month is in the group at risk. Before replying or sharing a Medicare number, bank details or a Social Security number, the safer course is to leave the ad and look up the plan independently on the official site.
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What the report counted
The Center for Countering Digital Hate’s report, titled Scambook, looked at advertising in Meta’s public Ad Library. A keyword search returned 93,779 potential scam ads from 2,908 advertisers. The researchers then reviewed the advertisers behind most of the ad spending and identified 30 they classed as Medicare scammers, which together ran 42,984 ads.
The 215 million figure is an estimate of impressions, meaning the number of times an ad was shown, not the number of separate people who saw one. According to the full report, it comes from Meta’s own Ad Library ranges, using the midpoint of each ad’s lower and upper bound. The total for that one year was 215,178,203, against 37,920,806 for all earlier years back to 2019, a multiple of 5.7. This is the researchers’ count, not a government finding.
Older users took the brunt. The report says 73 percent of the impressions, about 185 million, reached people 65 and over, and another 50 million reached people 55 to 64. The report also discusses a surge in Medicare Advantage scams and the rules for marketing those plans. Meta has not been shown in the report to have broken any law, and the group’s calls for new rules are advocacy, not requirements.
Where to compare plans safely
Medicare’s own plan finder lists the plans available at a given ZIP code, with costs and drug coverage, and it is free. A plan found through an ad can be checked there by name before any application is started.
For personal help, Medicare.gov points to the State Health Insurance Assistance Program, known as SHIP, which offers free counseling. The program is not connected to any insurance company or health plan, which is the main difference from an agent or an ad.
Two rules cover most of the risk. A caller who asks for a Medicare number, a bank account or a card number to “lock in” a benefit is not a safe route, and neither is any ad that guarantees an allowance card. A real plan will still be there after a day spent comparing it on the official site.
What a bad click can cost
The loss from a fake plan ad is rarely the ad itself. It is what follows: a Medicare number used for billing fraud, a bank login handed over to a lookalike site, or a plan switched without consent. The report cites FTC data that Americans lost more than $2 billion in 2025 to scams that began on social media, with Facebook the platform where the most was lost.
Anyone who realizes they gave details to an ad or caller can report it to Medicare at 1-800-MEDICARE and to the FTC, and should watch bank and claims statements for the next several months. Those who are still within open enrollment can switch back to a plan of their choice by Dec. 7 if a plan was changed without their say-so; after that date, Medicare Advantage enrollees have a separate period from January 1 to March 31, according to Medicare.gov.
Is the plan ad on your phone the real one?
Open enrollment gives scammers a nearly eight-week window, and the deadline is the pressure point. A fake ad that captures a bank login or a Medicare number does its damage after Dec. 7 passes, when the plan choice is locked but the account is not.
“Scam-Proof Your Accounts in a Weekend” is ten moves in the order that protects the most money first, including “how to lock your bank logins with two-step login, alerts and a verbal password,” “how to freeze your credit at all three bureaus, free by federal law” and “a family code word for fake grandchild-in-trouble calls.” It ends with a first-hour plan for when a scam gets through anyway.
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
Warren Cohen is a finance writer based in Phoenix, Arizona, covering personal finance topics including credit, banking, and beginner investing. He earned his degree in business administration from Arizona State University and began his career working in consumer finance, where he gained direct experience with lending and credit systems. He now writes for personal finance websites and fintech platforms, focusing on clear, practical content that helps readers make informed financial decisions.
