The number of fake accounts on Facebook is roughly the size of Egypt’s population and larger than most of the world’s countries, reports Mashable: 83.09 million.
The astonishing figure makes up 8.7% of all Facebook’s 995 million active viewers, says the Daily Mail. According to the London daily, Facebook classified the fake accounts in three groups:
-4.8% were duplicate accounts, such as accounts set up by people to keep their activities hidden from their partner or their parents.
-2.4% were “user-misclassified” accounts, where “users have created personal profiles for a business, organization or non-human entity such as a pet” according to Facebook.
-1.5% were “undesirable” accounts were profiles were deemed to be in breach of Facebook’s terms of service; accounts set up to send out spam emails.
Facebook, reports BBC News, whose business model relies on targeted advertising, is coming under increased scrutiny over the worth of its advertising model which promotes the gathering of likes from users.