Google took down more than 1.7 billion ‘bad ads’ in 2016

Google removed more than 1.7 billion “bad ads” that violated its policies in 2016, up from 780 million in 2015.

These bad ads constitute what the tech giant refers to as “misrepresenting content.” This can be anything from impersonating Google products, content that leads users to engage with other content under false or unclear pretenses, or pretending to be affiliated with or endorsed by another party.

Updated technology now recognizes and shuts down harmful ads more quickly. The company reviewed 550 sites suspected of sharing this misrepresenting content to users and disabled 340 of them.

In 2016, Google disabled 112 million “trick to click” ads, which was six times more than those found in 2015. These are ads that appear as system warnings, but when they are opened can actually spread malware on the device.

It also disabled over 80 million bad ads for healthcare and illegal gambling violations.

Ads aren’t the only misleading content that the company is interested in taking off the internet. Along with social media giant Facebook, Google has said it may expand its tech to combat fake news in Canada.

[source]Google Blog[/source]