One out of 12 accounts on the Facebook could be fake, according to the world’s no.1 social-networking site’s latest accounts.
It means that 83 million of the site’s estimated 955 million users worldwide 8.7pc are not real.
In an appendix to its second-quarter results, in which it reported lukewarm profits and slowing growth which saw shares plunge, it said the phenomenon was more pronounced in the developing world, where it is enjoying rapid growth.
The California-based giant has lost nearly £32bn (€40.7bn) in value since it was floated in May. Large numbers of fake accounts could undermine the site’s appeal to advertisers.
Facebook said duplicate profiles accounted for 4.8pc of users, while misclassified accounts — which can be business accounts wrongly labelled as private individuals — stood at 2.4pc. The company said 1.5pc of users were considered “undesirable”, which means they breach the social network’s rules.
