Section 230 Applies to Scammy Ads–Glazer v. Facebook

The plaintiff is octogenarian Barry Glazer, an attorney who has a fascinating history of running TV ads and who sells merch at his website that includes his tagline “Don’t urinate on my leg and tell me it’s raining.”

[Note: If you are aware of other attorneys who sell self-promotional branded merch, please let me know. I can’t recall seeing it before.]

In an unusually candid public admission, Glazer says he got fleeced by Facebook ads–something attorneys normally would not want to admit because it might prompt existing and potential clients to question the lawyer’s professional competence. Glazer claims to be a coin collector. He says he thought that the prices on some advertised coins were “implausibly low” but bought them anyway. Unsurprisingly, the coins proved to be counterfeits. Essentially, he admits that he knew he was getting fleeced but transacted anyway. The fact that Glazer opted into the scam gives this case an “OK, boomer” vibe. He sued Facebook anyway.

[Note: unusually, the case remained in Maryland rather than transferring to the Northern District of California, although the judge does apply California law. Due to the venue and choice of law, the judge freely flips between citing Fourth Circuit and Ninth Circuit cases.]

Section 230

Glazer argued that Facebook allowed or permitted the publication of the third-party ads and failed to implement adequate safeguards against fraudulent ads. The court says all of those arguments implicate Facebook’s editorial functions.

The court says the breach of contract claim (that Facebook didn’t enforce its content rules properly) gets knocked out due to Barnes–but the court doesn’t cite either Calise or YOLO, both of which I think squarely rejected this same argument. It’s as if Calise, YOLO, and their progeny simply don’t exist in this case’s universe. The court says:

Unlike in Barnes, Glazer has failed to allege that Meta promised expressly to remove or otherwise address the fraudulent postings. He points to a provision in Meta’s TOS in which Meta merely assures its users that it works to detect improper use of its websites and that it “may take appropriate action” if it learns of any such misuse. Such language, however, constitutes a “general monitoring policy” and “does not suffice for contract liability.” Glazer does not highlight any other provision in the TOS as imposing a duty on Meta to remove content, nor does the Court find any such provision in the TOS. In fact, Meta warns in its TOS that it is not responsible for the content or actions of its users. Thus, absent an affirmative promise from Meta to remove the fraudulent posts, Glazer’s breach of contract claim, as to both a breach of an express provision and a breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, is grounded in the dissemination of improper content.

By treating Barnes as the dispositive precedent, this opinion is like a 15-year-old time capsule. How did that happen? My current hypothesis is that neither side cited Calise in their moving papers. If true, that would blow my mind.

To get around Section 230, Glazer also tried an unsuccessful “but the algorithms” argument:

Glazer has not alleged that the advertisements here are discriminatory, nor has he alleged sufficient facts that Meta, via its questionnaire and “discriminatory algorithm,” contributed to the fraudulent nature of the advertisements. In other words, Glazer has failed to adequately allege that Meta “materially contributed to the piece(s) of information relevant to liability.”

Facebook qualifies for Section 230 for all claims.

Prima Facie Elements

The court also grants Facebook’s 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss for failure of the prima facie elements. Yet again, reforming Section 230 would not lead to a different outcome in this case.

Fraud/Negligent Misrepresentation

Glazer fails to allege sufficient facts demonstrating that Meta, as opposed to the coin sellers, knew about the fraudulent advertisements let alone intended to defraud him through those advertisements…The fact that Meta “employ[s] dedicated teams” to detect harmful content does not mean that Meta did in fact find and detect the falsity of the fraudulent advertisements that Glazer takes issue with

The court also says he can’t plead justifiable reliance given his purported expertise as a coin collector who should have the ability to spot “facially deceptive” ads that were “patently obvious” frauds.

Negligence

Facebook didn’t owe Glazer a duty of care:

Meta’s TOS contain no affirmative obligation to review and approve advertisements or listings on Facebook Marketplace other than a general monitoring policy. In fact, Meta’s TOS state that Meta does “not control or direct what people and others do or say, and [Meta is] not responsible for their actions or conduct…or any content they share….”

Also, “under the CDA, Meta has no legal duty to monitor users’ content.” The court seems to be double-dipping on the Section 230 defense to address prima facie issues here.

Contract Breach

Glazer “cites to a provision in the TOS in which Meta states that it may remove harmful content if Meta learns of it, but this provision does not, as Glazer suggests, obligate Meta to remove such content. Moreover, the TOS contain a provision in which Meta expressly disclaims responsibility for third parties’ content on Facebook.

On remand, the district court in Calise v. Facebook reached a different conclusion about the binding nature of Facebook’s purported promises.

The implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing doesn’t offer any better recourse to Glazer: “Meta’s TOS, however, did not create an express obligation to remove fraudulent content, and the implied covenant cannot insert such an obligation into the TOS.”

Implications

The net effect of this ruling is that Facebook is completely off-the-hook for scammy ads, despite the Ninth Circuit caselaw that I thought put Facebook back on the hook. Perhaps this opinion might be interpreted as a rejection of the Calise decision, or at least a judge who decided not to rely on its flawed reasoning. The judge also blended Ninth Circuit precedent with the limited good parts of the Fourth Circuit’s Henderson decision and the more recent MP v. Meta decision. By ignoring Calise and turning to Fourth Circuit 230 caselaw, the court reached a more sensible result than the Ninth Circuit’s jurisprudence.

Lawyers-as-plaintiffs are a particularly interesting group of plaintiffs because, if their cases on their own behalf fail in court, it raises questions about their professional judgment when they represent other clients. At minimum, it shows the challenges when lawyers stray beyond their swimlanes.

Case Citation: Glazer v. Meta Platforms, Inc., 2025 WL 2958810 (D. Md. Oct. 17, 2025). Glazer is involved with a separate lawsuit against Google and Facebook over real estate matters. I don’t think this ruling bodes well for that case.