Mark Zuckerberg sues Meta - but he's not who you think

Mark Zuckerberg - not that one - is suing Meta, the owner of Facebook.

After years of putting up with people mistaking him for the founder of Facebook, the Indiana bankruptcy lawyer has had enough.

Between 2022 and 2025, Mr Zuckerberg paid over $11,000 (£8,160) to Meta to advertise his law business, in an attempt to draw new clients to his law practice.

His adverts, however, were repeatedly removed for "impersonating a celebrity" or using an inauthentic name, according to the legal filing.

It was the final straw for a man who had been dealing with sharing the name of one of the world's most powerful men for well over a decade.

He has documented the struggles of being Mark S Zuckerberg (rather than Meta's Mark E Zuckerberg) on his website, in a list entitled: "Things that have happened to me because my name is Mark S Zuckerberg (I give it Zero likes)".

According to the list, he was mistakenly sued by the State of Washington who thought he was the Meta owner.

He said his Facebook account is "constantly hacked", businesses refuse to take his bookings as they think it is a prank and on the family tree website 23andMe, he has more than 753 people claiming to be relatives who "immediately request money".

While speaking at a Las Vegas event, he said "a limo-driver was waiting for me at the bottom of the escalator with a sign saying 'Mark Zuckerberg', causing chaos as a large disappointed crowd had been waiting".

During an email exchange he shared between himself and Meta employees after his account was deactivated again, he said: "If you happen to run into the younger, richer Mark Zuckerberg, tell him I say hi and he causes me great aggravation each day."

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The Indiana lawyer has spent years in communication with Facebook and verified his identity using government-issued ID and other documents, according to the emails, but his accounts were still repeatedly deactivated.

Meta employees would then have to reinstate his accounts, according to the emails, and mark the pages as "verified" to stop it from happening again.

In one email asking for help, he said to Meta: "I don't want to make waves or cause problems, I just want my account to be reactivated and [be] left to play on the social media in peace."

Now, however, he says he has lost thousands of dollars in advertising fees and is suing the company.

"It's not funny," he said to Indianapolis news channel WTHR. "Not when they take my money. This really pissed me off."

"It's like buying a billboard on the side of the highway, paying the people for the billboard and then they come and put a giant blanket over it and you don't get the benefit of what you paid for," he said.

He is accusing Meta of attempting to prevent him from having "full use, benefit and enjoyment" of his own legal name, which he was given before the celebrity Mark Zuckerberg was even born.

The case has been lodged in Indiana's Marion Superior Court.

Sky News has contacted Meta for comment.