Can everyone stop LYING about numbers please?

I understand that people want to make things sound as exciting and impressive as possible. I am however, sick and tired of seeing numbers wildly exaggerated to the point that they are clearly total fabrications / falsely inflated / any other euphemism you’d like to use. What annoys me the most about these gross manipulations is that not only are they then quoted by others as if gospel but they are also fairly easy to disprove, should one undertake just the tinniest amount of research. 

Three of these forgeries I would like to call out now;

1. One billion people supported droga5's Beyonce campaign

The Real Winners of London 2012; Paddy Power, Nike and Beats.

The Olympic advertising rules and regulations were always going to provoke some great work because they forced brands to think beyond the obvious and they intrinsically required a bold and innovative solution to be by-passed.  Three things in particualr stood out about them for me;

1. Inspiration can come from anywhere.