Swartz, L. (2026). Social media in the scam age. Social Media + Society, 12. https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051261437922
Summary
Lana Swartz argues that social media is entering a “scam age,” in which scams are not peripheral criminal deviations but a central organizing logic of platform economies and culture. Written as a reflective anniversary essay rather than an empirical study, the piece contends that the boundaries between legitimate and illegitimate economic activity are dissolving as platform rules, anti-fraud infrastructures, and hustle culture are jointly rebuilt. Drawing on the author’s prior research in cryptocurrency and financial technology—plus autobiographical reflection on growing up in scam-saturated 1990s Miami—Swartz issues an agenda-setting call for scholars to treat scams, and the discursive category of “scam” itself, as a key site for understanding platform governance, economic citizenship, and possible online futures.
Key Contributions
- Reframes scams as a central object of study for social media research, not marginal crime.
- Introduces the concept of “network scams”—massively multiplayer, multi-role fraud in which believer, shill, and victim blur—replacing the dyadic con-artist/mark model.
- Links platform governance and anti-fraud infrastructures to questions of economic citizenship, surveillance, and data access.
- Offers Florida as a historical and metaphorical lens (Ponzi, the 1920s land boom, the Howey Test, Miami as “crypto capital”)—a “digital swampland” for theorizing scam-driven futures.
- Argues that calling something a “scam” performs boundary work that legitimates some capitalism while delegitimating other forms.
Methods
Reflective and essayistic argument, situated in an anniversary special issue rather than a data-driven study. Swartz synthesizes her prior research on cryptocurrency, fintech, and the digital economy, framing the argument autobiographically and historically through Florida as an analytic case. The piece engages secondary sources and cultural commentary, including scholarship on racial capitalism.
Findings
- The global scam industry was estimated at $1.03 trillion in 2024; most Americans have experienced an online scam, and over a third report losing money or personal information.
- Scams disproportionately target vulnerable populations: children on Roblox, teens via sextortion, immigrants via naturalization-service scams, and poor people via government-assistance scams.
- New communication technologies historically generate new scam vectors; AI tools such as deepfakes are dramatically expanding scam scale and efficiency.
- Scammy alternatives to failing institutions—MLMs, crypto, creator platforms, hustle courses—are routed through and dependent on social media infrastructures.
- Anti-fraud measures legitimize behavioral data collection used for profiling, targeting, algorithmic sorting, and training AI models.
Connections
As a platform-critique anniversary essay, this sits alongside other reflective pieces in the same register such as Baym2026-tr and Marwick2026-ss. Its claim that anti-fraud and scam-prevention infrastructures function as expansive surveillance-legitimating governance mechanisms speaks directly to platform-governance work on data access and infrastructural control, including Helmond2026-ll and Rieder2026-pp. The essay’s attention to who is authorized as a legitimate economic actor also resonates with governance debates about platform authority and access more broadly.
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