Even as Google crypto ban continues unabated, the genuine crypto businesses are suffering while crypto phishing sites and scams are doing brisk business. The global tech giant does not entertain ay cryptocurrency-based business advertisement on its search engine results pages, thereby alienating even good crypto brands.
Now, crypto exchange Coin Corner has reported that a website impersonating it has been using Google’s advertising services. Sadly, the Google crypto ban hurts only genuine crypto businesses with good intent but allows such phishing scams to go unnoticed right under its nose.
Coin Corner has repeatedly appealed to Google to enable it to use Google Ads but to no avail. Surely, Coin Corner won’t like a fraudulent website to enjoy the same privileges that were denied to its legitimate operations.
Google crypto ban doesn’t work for phishing scams
Molly Spiers of Coin Corner said that it is disheartening to see that despite the harsh Google crypto ban, crypto phishing scams to go on unabated. Legitimate crypto businesses are being denied access to Google Ads, but fraudulent entities are enjoying the same platform and scamming the users. Unfortunately, they are also undermining the legitimate crypto businesses by using their name as a front. They have asked Google to pay attention to these instances and rethink about Google crypto ban.
https://twitter.com/coincornermolly/status/1255788027563122688
Spiers tweeted about a Goole advert in which a similar-sounding fraudulent business named www.coincornerr.com is operating freely under Google’s nose. This is a phishing website impersonating Coin Corner. What’s surprising is that Google algorithms weren’t able to detect a crypto phishing website and instead gave it a higher page ranking in the search results.
Sneaky tactics employed by phishing scam websites
Google has enacted policies whereby any adverts promoting crypto-related businesses or has crypto-related keywords are not allowed. The fraudulent website in question has used the entire text of Coin Corner but removed the BTC reference, thereby fooling Google’s algorithm to get top rankings.
https://twitter.com/coincornermolly/status/1255849017579311104
Google crypto ban was put in place in 2018 to protect its users against crypto-related scams and attacks. Later on, it lifted the ban partially to help legitimate crypto exchanges to take part in its ads program. However, the ban is still applicable to all the entities operating outside the U.S. and Japan. Unfortunately, this incident shows that the Google crypto ban is working only in theory and not practice.
Registered, legitimate, and genuine crypto businesses are suffering under the Google crypto ban while phishing scams are flourishing right under the search giant’s nose. Google’s stance against crypto is well known as the company doesn’t favor cryptocurrencies openly and often lays subtle impediments to its growth.
