Google is taking down 100 'bad' ads every second to curb scams

Search giant Google is pulling down more than 100 ‘scam’ advertisements every second for violating its policies and will soon implement a verification programme to further weed out such elements from its platform, the company said in a blog post.

“We have teams of engineers, policy experts, product managers and others who wage a daily fight against bad actors,” said David Graff, director of global product policy at Google. “Just last year alone, we took down more than 3.2 billion ads that violated our advertising policies.”

The move comes after scamsters were found using Google's advertising system to create misleading advertisements.

In the blog post, Google pointed out that it is specifically monitoring the increase in misleading behaviour in some specific categories and is taking additional action. 

For example, the company has banned ads for payday loans and bail bonds services and has developed advanced verification programmes to fight fraud in areas such local locksmith services and addiction treatment centres

“We're taking another step. We've seen a rise in misleading ad experiences stemming from third-party technical support providers and have decided to begin restricting ads in this category globally," added Graff.

In the coming months, Google will roll out a verification programme to ensure that only legitimate providers of third-party tech support can use its platform to reach consumers.

“These efforts alone won’t stop all bad actors trying to game our advertising systems, but it will make it a lot harder. One of our top priorities is to maintain a healthy advertising ecosystem, and that means protecting people from misleading, inappropriate and harmful ads," Google said

These developments come in the backdrop of a wider campaign against misinformation, where social networking giant Facebook and its instant messaging platform WhatsApp have been cracking down on the spread of fake news especially in the political context.

Facebook has started scoring its users based on their trustworthiness in an attempt to fight misinformation, apart from banning pages that indulge in such activities.

WhatsApp has also made tweaks such as limiting forwards to curb the spread of fake messages.