Google is taking its fight against spam and false business advertisements seriously with a recent lawsuit. The tech giant is striving to eliminate fraudulent Business Profiles and reviews through a lawsuit. Its purpose is to deter bad actors from using Google Maps and Business Profiles to deceive customers. The lawsuit indicates that scammers posted over 350 fraudulent Business Profiles and tried to enhance them with over 14,000 fake reviews. This is a concerning issue since false reviews can lower a genuine business’s reputation and, in turn, reduce sales.
The details of the lawsuit are found in court documents where Defendants Ethan QiQi Hu, GMBEye, Rafadigital, LLC, and Does 1-20 are listed. The defendants have allegedly created fictitious profiles and reviews of businesses that do not exist. These profiles are sold to individuals and entities, who are trying to promote their businesses on Google platforms. In the lawsuit, the defendants deceive small business owners by making false claims, such as promising to guarantee favorable positions in Google’s search results.
The main goal of Google’s lawsuit is to put an end to this complex and misleading scheme that deceives consumers, business owners, and Google. The lawsuit is complete with screenshots and alleged methods used by the defendants. Previous attempts by Google to tackle this issue include filing lawsuits against not only maps but also web searches.
Google’s efforts to target these spammers would likely have significant impacts on those scammers who have not yet been sued by Google. Hopefully, it would encourage them to stop their practices. Besides removing spam and false profiles, the lawsuit is a step toward promoting genuine business reviews and ratings.
We want to thank the thought leader Barry Schwartz as the source for this content and such awesome teachings on the subject, and we hope that this article can help you and your business! Here’s the link to his post https://searchengineland.com/google-files-lawsuit-over-fake-review-scams-428365
