Martin Lewis, the founder of MoneySavingExpert, has issued a stern warning to LinkedIn users about the proliferation of spam advertisements that misuse his image to endorse money scams on the social media platform. This alert was triggered by a Twitter user who tagged Mr. Lewis in a post, stating that their LinkedIn feed was inundated with images of him seemingly endorsing a scheme he would not typically support.
One such misleading advertisement claimed, “Martin Lewis reveals the secret to making £300 into £6,000 in one week”. Several other users reported encountering similar ads and despite reporting them, the ads persisted. In response to this, Mr. Lewis released a statement on Twitter, expressing his team’s efforts to contact LinkedIn regarding the surge of these fraudulent ads featuring him.
Mr. Lewis expressed dissatisfaction with LinkedIn’s response, urging users to continue reporting these ads. He further clarified that he does not have a LinkedIn account, thus any endorsement appearing there is false.
This is not the first time the 51-year-old finance expert has had to deal with such issues. Just last month, he issued a similar warning when scam posts on Facebook claimed that a £250 investment could yield a monthly return of £27,720. These posts also featured Mr. Lewis’ picture alongside a recommendation supposedly from him.
The scam posts were riddled with grammatical errors and typos, falsely suggesting that Mr. Lewis endorsed the dubious “opportunity”. Upon inquiry, Mr. Lewis confirmed that the ad was a scam orchestrated by criminals and strongly advised users to steer clear of them.
In the past, Mr. Lewis has taken legal action against such fraudulent activities. In 2018, he initiated High Court proceedings against Facebook for defamation after more than 1,000 scam ads using his name or image surfaced on the platform. The case was settled after Facebook agreed to cover his legal costs, launch a dedicated tool for reporting spam ads, and donate £3m to Citizens Advice to establish a UK Scams Action project.
