Late last week, Dan Taylor of Google Ads put out a tweet saying that Adalytics has established a track record of publishing inaccurate reports that misrepresent Google's products and make widely exaggerated claims.

The reason? Adalytics came out with a "shattering" report about Google, its SPN network, and how Google search throws up porn and piracy, even in geo-restricted "rogue state" IPs. This isn't an axis of evil though, it's an axis of Google.

The report by Adalytics examined the kind of websites that are reportedly part of the Google Search Partners Network, and identified tens of thousands of risky and risque sites that displayed ads from major advertisers and the world's most valuable companies. The report also raises concerns about Google's influence and the various platforms in which it shapes its digital experience.

When asked for comment by exchange4media, Google provided the following context, “Search ads can appear when an advertiser’s keywords are relevant to a user's search. These sites are maintained by search partner websites and campaigns opted into SPN can serve search ads via AdSense for Search (AFS) or Programmable Search Engine (ProSe). Advertisers only pay when someone clicks on their search ad (CPC). Advertisers can exclude their ads from showing on specific SPN sites by speaking to their account representative.”

We also offer transparency on where Search and Shopping campaigns run. Any advertiser with these campaigns can learn about how much of their spend is on Search vs. SPN inventory (via Segment by Network report), and additionally request an SPN report from their account manager.”

In a later more comprehensive statement, Taylor, said, “The examples shared are from our Programmable Search Engine (ProSE) product (a miniscule part of our Search Partner Network), which is a free search tool we offer to small websites so that they can present a search experience directly on their sites. Ads may appear based on the user’s specific search query; they are not targeted to, or based on, the website they appear on. Websites who merely implement ProSE do not get any ad revenue from those ads. Moreover, ProSE represents a miniscule amount of our Search Partner Network. Adalytics' revenue implications related to small sites like the examples we've reviewed are frankly absurd.”  

“My personal take is that it should have no impact on Google ad spends. While we understand that Google probably wouldn’t have the similar control over the GSP eco-system but for God's sake, we are talking about “The Tech Giant” who is not out there to run random business,” asserts Kumar Awanish, Chief Growth Officer, Cheil India.

While observing Google keeps on putting stringent checks continually and eliminates such dubious publishers and its malicious content Awanish, also notes, “It is true that Google’s PMAX ad is an AI driven ad hence there is a limitation to control this environment through a button of click but an advertiser has an option to keep such sites stamping out consistently. I think we should fight this battle together to make this ecosystem better.”

While there certainly needs to be a nuanced discussion, and hopefully resolve issues and ongoing debates about the power dynamics in the tech industry, there is a larger story here.

When one was in college, we were taught the Six Sigma ideal. That you can establish workflow and processes because of sheer scale and your efficiency ensures there's an incidence of 3.4 errors in one million (or less catchily, a 99.9996% accuracy) in your product or service.

This story isn't about Six Sigma. It's not about ideals. It's about Google. If you're reading this article, dear reader, you're aware of Google. Google dominates our digital experience and Google was started by two nerds, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, with the company motto: don't be evil.

Google controls the internet, it has over 90% market share. The reporter of this article had to Google on Google about how Google might be irresponsible. Despite the billions of dollars being poured into ChatGPT to power Bing, few people are using it as of yet. And the remaining few use DuckDuckGo, which is built on the Google template in any case.

The point here is that if and when advertisers buy search ads with Google, because that is what we search things on, their ads can potentially end up on bad actor websites, because of the sheer volume of ads.

As you can imagine, it was very hard to get people to talk about this on the record. But as someone told your reporter they can’t manually vet each site in the platform; while at the same time they can’t make it extra difficult to approve each site.

"They can’t do manual checks since this will slow down the process. Someone checking with intent is bound to find a few sites that are questionable. The question is, what’s the acceptance level? These cases are typically 1 in a million.” Back to Six Sigma.