Comment by Jskewel
10 hours ago
Adsense has been a nightmare for us.
They have been putting thousands of scam adverts on our website for some time. Think "you have been looking at xxx and must pay a $100 fine" type popup nonsense. Hosted on the following websites:
azurestaticapps.net
azurewebsites.net
herokuapp.com
ondigitalocean.app
digitaloceanspaces.com
netlify.app
Google doesn't allow you to block these domains, because they consider them "TLDs" (the scammers use a new subdomain every day eg abcdefg.herokuapp.com). The scammers get banned and return the next day with a new account and subdomain (repeat every day). Therefore we cannot stop them. It's bizarre and baffling. But Google Adsense had to go.
Yep. Same!! https://www.cannonade.net/blog/why-i-turned-off-google-adsen...
Wow I am surprised to see this.
I created a tool that automatically follows ads to try to find scams.
But that was usually reserved to typosquat domain ads or ads on porn websites. I didn't know scammers used normal page ads too.
I know tech support scams used to use google search ads, but I don't think they do that as much anymore, so maybe they have moved onto things like adsense.
These scammers usually do IP address checks to check for residential IP before showing the scam, and some also do some basic fingerprinting checks, so that is how they get past detection. That said, it shouldn't be too difficult for google to do some better checks if they actually cared.
Yep. I Agree. I believe it's a question of economics, not technical challenges.
Google is absolutely smart enough to make these attacks un-economical. IMO they are unwilling to incur the loss in revenue this would involve (false positives, banned resellers etc).
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> These scammers usually do IP address checks to check for residential IP before showing the scam, and some also do some basic fingerprinting checks, so that is how they get past detection.
Same issue with spam sms in my country: I think they geo-locate it so submitting the link to safe browsing project takes way too long
A friend of mine runs a web agency company (you know, the oldskool wordpress dev shop). Clients from almost all industries, some very high traffic & publicly visible (think magazines). About two years ago they recommended all their clients remove random ads (primarily via Adsense) as they were injecting crypto-scams and porny/gaming ads for trashy site/apps on sites where they really shouldn't be. Some clients completely dropped it just fine (meaning, no replacement ad engine), while the bigger clients are using purely targeted/specified ads where they know the brand being advertised, typically from within in their own industries, and no more random ads being shown. People are fed up with ads/Adsense. Just the the stuff kids see while playing mobile games are atrocious.
Even reddit bans any netlify.app url in messages or posts (at least for me). Never checked for comments.
>They have been putting thousands of scam adverts on our website…
Is it your website or theirs? YOU are the one putting such ads there as YOU have chosen a sketchy ad company (google).
The problem is the scummy adsense ads don't hurt Google's reputation. Outside the techie crowd people don't know the ads are from Google.
That seems fixable. When people include this JS garbage, have a header/title/etc stating that this is Google's professional opinion. Bake it into a library offering enough other features that a large number of people are inclined to use it.
The only people that would care are already using adblockers and not seeing these ads anyway.
hmm could you explain more?
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It doesn't practically matter whether the ads are from google. They're shown on a third party site, not using google won't get rid of them, only not using that site will (or installing an adblocker...). Users very reasonably blame the site, who have direct agency to remove the ads.
IIRC this dilemma was one of the things that was driving the Google antitrust case that unfortunately will not result in divorcing search from ads.
Agree it's reasonable. I removed the ads :P
Calls from law enforcement is laud and clear: BigTech is not doing enough to fight fraud, war and other crimes, they make money from criminals.
Nobody’s yet cared enough to sue them, or their managers at ICC yet. However, eventually an ambitious lawyer will try to make the case, especially if fraud and human trafficking continues to grow like it is.
> at ICC yet.
Want to take bets on whether the US gov wades in if that happens?
The US gov is directly antagonistic to the ICC and will undermine them whenever possible. This would present them another chance.
It does in the sense that they're losing business, as people describe in this thread. But I get your point, Google seems to be enjoying the profits more than the harm to their reputation. If it gets bad enough, maybe they'll rethink.
They're losing business that they don't want. Silicon Valley culture has embraced saying no, firing clients and customers, choosing the right audience, etc. This even fits into finding product-market fit. You don't try to please everyone, and find a well-defined segment. So to Google it might not seem like it's getting bad at all. To them, maybe the trash took itself out, they got rid of that annoying customer who complains about their marketplace, whereas they appreciate the quiet reporting of an ad that's against the ToS...
I suppose the obvious question is: Are you actively profiting from Adsense?
If yes, then ... you are profiting from ... that shite. You must be OK with that and it does sound like you are actively complicit with it, despite your protestations.
If you really think that Adsense is awful and might damage your brand then dump it and don't whine on HN!
OK, that's probably a bit unfair because you are dealing with a monopoly with no recourse to arbitration. That's your real problem.
Read their last sentence again.
“AdSense has got to go” should include OP’s use if they truly believe that. That’s what the person you’re responding to is saying.
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Classic example of victim blaming. Not the company generating the ad, not the company approving it, but the person who is trying to block it, and then ACTUALLY did stop using Adsense.