Money | Facebook Facebook Video Ad Scam Costs It $40M Company was accused of inflating the amount of time users watched videos By Newser Editors and Wire Services Posted Oct 8, 2019 12:24 AM CDT Copied Facebook denied wrongdoing but agreed to pay up. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon, File) Facebook has agreed to pay $40 million to advertisers who said it inflated the amount of time its users watched videos. The San Jose Mercury News says the California-based social media giant denied any wrongdoing in a lawsuit settlement. The settlement notice was filed Friday by the plaintiffs in Oakland federal court. Advertisers sued Facebook in 2016 over user metrics that supposedly measured the average length of time consumers spent viewing posted video ads. The lawsuit said that the time was inflated by up to 900% and that helped convince advertisers to buy Facebook's video advertising services, the AP reports. Facebook publicly acknowledged an error in the formula. The company denied allegations that its engineers knew about problems for more than a year and did nothing. Read These Next Beyonce leaves national anthem unfinished. Musk says his new party is in business. See the best BBQ cities in the US. A space capsule carrying ashes of 160 people crashed in the ocean. Report an error