If the ads were targeted to people searching for [brandname] then that would be straight up illegal. Companies woyld have a slam dunk case in court.
Comment on US accuses Google of illegal methods to push up ad prices
TWeaK@lemm.ee 8 months ago
More interesting is what came out during the deposition: Google straight up changes your search terms to give you results that trigger paid advertisements. Eg if you search for “children’s shirts” it will swap for " shirts" and show you ads for that brand.
Maestro@kbin.social 8 months ago
TWeaK@lemm.ee 8 months ago
That’s the thing though, proving it would be next to impossible.
BeefPiano@lemmy.world 8 months ago
A subpoena would do the trick. Their employees aren’t going to jail for obstruction to protect Google.
TWeaK@lemm.ee 8 months ago
You need some reasonable grounds to put before a judge before they’ll grant a subpoena. A subpoena can confirm what they suspect, it can’t be used to blindly fish for evidence.
However it could be that what was in the deposition gives them the grounds. Should be an interesting trial.
Steeve@lemmy.ca 8 months ago
Does it swap search terms just for the portion that returns the ad or for the search as well? If it’s just the ad that doesn’t seem very problematic. If it’s for the search as well, I don’t see how that would benefit Google. They wouldn’t be able to consider a search result click a successful conversion if it wasn’t an actual advertisement.