Beware Fake Olympics Shop Meta Ads

Facebook and Instagram, two of the biggest social media platforms, have been hit with a large-scale malicious advertising (malvertising) campaign in recent weeks. The scam ads seem to promote Winter Olympics merchandise, but actually send unsuspecting users to fraudulent websites where they can fall victim to phishing, fraud, and identity theft.

Read on to learn all about the fake “Olympics Shop” Meta ads scam, including how to avoid it.

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What Is the Fake Olympics Shop Meta Ads Scam?

The scammers behind this recent wave of malicious Meta ads are attempting to latch onto the hype and popularity around the 2026 Winter Olympics. They’ve created a series of fake social media ads which, if clicked, lead to fake websites that are designed to look almost identical to the real “Olympic Shop” site, which can be seen in the screenshot above.

The genuine “Olympic Shop” is a safe, legitimate site selling the likes of hoodies, headwear, shorts, T-shirts, and accessories for men, women, and kids, themed with Olympics branding and team logos. The fake sites seem similar, also offering what appears to be genuine Olympics merchandise, often with massive discounts of up to 80% compared to the regular retail prices.

In reality, these fake sites are simply scams, aimed at stealing money and data from victims. If users click on the sites and create accounts, scammers may harvest their data or use their login credentials to attempt to gain access to their profiles on other platforms. If the victims actually place an order, the scammers will usually pocket the money and provide no products, or low quality fakes, in return.

Signs of Malicious Meta Ads

One of the reasons this scam (and others like it) works so well is because the ads and the sites they lead have been carefully designed to look legitimate. With that said, there are still several key signs you can look for to spot these scams:

Unusual domain names: The official Olympic Shop site uses this domain: https://shop.olympics.com. The fakes use a wide range of variations that may look legitimate at first glance but never actually match the real thing, like “olympicseu.shop” or “2026olympics.store”.
Too good to be true prices: The fake ads and websites typically entice users to click, create accounts, and place orders by claiming to offer official Olympics merchandise for a fraction of the usual price. They may offer discounts of up to 80%, for example, as well as other promotional offers or free shipping deals.
Newly created pages: Various cybersecurity firms have noticed that a lot of these fake Facebook and Instagram ads are created by brand-new pages. It appears that scammers are cloning their fake sites and making new social pages to spread the ads and get as many clicks as they can before Meta spots them and shuts them down.

How to Stay Safe

The easiest way to avoid scams like this is to simply not click on any ads you see on Facebook or Instagram, or at least be very wary of those that seem too good to be true. If you do click an ad, check the address of the websites it sends you to, as well as the site design, for any inconsistencies and typos, and remember that “shop.olympics.com” is the only official online Olympics store.

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