By
Bena Ilyas
April 10th, 2024
Google will manually approve the blockchain and cryptocurrency businesses providing better investor protection and weeding out illegitimate services and frauds.
Google, the Mountain View-based technology giant is all set to reverse its ban on cryptocurrency advertisements, starting next month. In its latest updated policy for financial services and products, the company said that it will “allow regulated cryptocurrency exchanges to advertise in the United States and Japan.”
The latest ban reversal means that from October 2018, only verified crypto companies in the blooming crypto market of US and Japan, can purchase ads on Google. In other countries, companies operating in the crypto space can still submit applications to Google for publishing ads. This means that Google plans to lift the ban in the international market in near future.
“Advertisers will need to be certified with Google for the specific country in which their ads will serve. Advertisers will be able to apply for certification once the policy launches in October. This policy will apply globally to all accounts that advertise these financial products,” Google wrote.
This move to manually approve the blockchain and cryptocurrency businesses is a welcome step from Google, which helps to further enhance investor protection weeding out illegitimate services and frauds. This is a good step from Google to combat fake news and more importantly keep its integrity intact.
Google’s Earlier Ban on Crypto Ads
Owing to the growing cryptocurrency frenzy earlier this year, Google along with other online media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, announced a ban on all cryptocurrency and ICO advertisements on its platform. During that time Google executive Scott Spencer said that the cryptocurrency investments can cause harm to global financial markets. He said:
“We don’t have a crystal ball to know where the future is going to go with cryptocurrencies, but we’ve seen enough consumer harm or potential for consumer harm that it’s an area that we want to approach with extreme caution.”
Additionally, the search engine behemoth also banned crypto mining apps from the Play Store this July. The ban was introduced due to a growing number of crypto-hacking incidents in the industry.
However, Google received much criticism from industry experts on its move. Blackmore Group CEO Philip Nunn said that it was premature on the part of Google has Facebook to ban cryptocurrency ads. In a word with The Independent, Nunn said:
“I understand that Facebook and Google are under a lot of pressure to regulate what their users are reading, but they are still advertising gambling websites and other unethical practices.”
Nunn said that the blanket ban by Google has caused a parallel damage to all the legitimate businesses operating in the cryptocurrency space. He also added that it is unfair on Google part to punish such legitimate businesses.