Documents made public in a lawsuit against Facebook Inc alleged that the digital platform ignored the concerns raised by employees about its "deeply wrong" ad reach estimation and reporting, Bloomberg reported.
In a lawsuit against Facebook filed by a small business owner alleged US District judge ruled that the company has overestimated its "potential reach." A US District Judge threw out Facebook's defense of breach of contract and gave a go-ahead for the trial.
The social media giant had requested to keep some filings confidential due to its sensitivity but the judge ruled that the matter involved public interest, the report said.
“Facebook knew the problem was largely due to fake and duplicate accounts,” but didn't correct it as it would have affected the revenue significantly. The Financial Times first reported on the case filings.
“It’s revenue we should have never made given the fact it’s based on wrong data,” product manager Yaron Fidler had responded in an email. Another employee stated that “the status quo in ad reach estimation and reporting is deeply wrong.”
Reportedly, the filings allege that the top executives including Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg were aware of the issue with the metric when Fidler had proposed fixing the issue. However, the social media giant refused to do it as the revue would be hit "significantly."
[Inputs from The Verge]