Remember the hype around cryptocurrency and being bombarded with ads after a simple search of what it is? Well all that is about to change. Google is planning to remove all cryptocurrency related advertisements in June of this year. Cryptocurrency related refers to ICOs (initial coin offerings), wallets and trading advice.
This means that companies with legitimate offerings won’t be allowed to use any of Google’s ad services including AdWords. Instead they will have to opt for advertising on their own website or through third parties.
The director of sustainable ads at Google, Scott Spencer, stated that the company has seen the harm that fake offerings has done for the public and has opted to remove them altogether to prevent any future harm to consumers.
The total ban on cryptocurrency related ads also follows the same suit that Facebook had done earlier this year. Facebook’s motive was to prevent people from advertising misleading or deceptive ploys to scam consumers. This doesn’t just affect companies; it also affects those who are professionals in the field who sell their expertise across platforms such as YouTube. People who rely upon Google or Facebook to promote their videos will be hindered due to this new restriction.
Facebook’s ban on the industry will span across all of their platforms not just exclusive to Facebook. Ads that violate the new policy on Instagram, ad networks or other ads from third parties will be removed immediately. One of the advertisement technology directors at Facebook stated that the policy is broad amongst all of their services for reason. They’re implementing it to combat deceptive and misleading advertisements. Once the signals for the advertisement platform increases, Facebook mentioned that they will revisit the policy and make necessary adjustments that they see fit.
As the cryptocurrency scene is a highly unregulated space, many scams have emerged scamming thousands of dollars out of people. Google mentioned that in 2017 they took down over 3.2 billion ads due to them violating their policies. This number is more than double the previous year of 1.7 billion ads being removed.
Alphabet, which is the parent company of Google, makes the majority of their profits from advertising. The shift to remove cryptocurrency content can be seen as removing a malicious industry to convince advertisers that their advertising platform is safe and scam free.