Latest news with #AdsSafetyReport
Zawya
18-04-2025
- Business
- Zawya
Google blocks 5.1 billion harmful ads with AI in 2024
Google has released its 2024 Ads Safety Report, showing how advanced artificial intelligence is transforming the fight against bad ads, scams, and misinformation online. As scams grow more sophisticated—often impersonating public figures or deploying AI-generated content—new tools are helping stop harmful ads before they ever reach people. In 2024 alone, Google blocked or removed 5.1 billion ads, restricted 9.1 billion more, and suspended over 39 million advertiser accounts—most before a single ad was served. This progress reflects how AI models, powered by Gemini, are enabling faster and smarter detection of fraud signals such as stolen payment methods, fake business identities, or coordinated scam networks. This shift toward proactive prevention comes at a critical time. Across Africa and beyond, users are navigating a rapidly evolving digital environment—where trust, safety, and transparency matter more than ever. In Nigeria, public figure impersonation scams and misleading election ads have become familiar threats. That's why in 2024, Google updated its Misrepresentation policy, assembled a global team of over 100 experts, and took down over 700,000 scam-related advertiser accounts—contributing to a 90% drop in reported impersonation scams. With nearly half the world's population heading to the polls in 2024, Google also expanded election ad transparency, requiring all political advertisers to verify their identities and clearly disclose who's paying for the message. More than 10 million election-related ads were removed globally for failing to meet these standards. While these are global figures, their local impact is deeply personal. From the business owner trying to reach new customers online to the everyday user trying to avoid a phishing scam, online safety remains essential for an open, trustworthy web. In Nigeria and across the continent, safe advertising also helps protect livelihoods—ensuring that small businesses, creators, and publishers can continue to benefit from a free and accessible internet. 'We launched over 50 enhancements to our AI models in 2024,' said Alex Rodriguez, General Manager for Ads Safety at Google. 'These improvements helped us move faster, identify threats earlier, and take action before bad actors could reach users. That's the real power of AI—making the internet safer not just reactively, but proactively.' While challenges persist, the report emphasizes that AI is improving both the speed and scale of enforcement—and freeing up human reviewers to focus on the most complex, high-impact investigations. Google also continues to work closely with regulators, consumer protection agencies, and industry peers, including through the Global Anti-Scam Alliance, to stay ahead of evolving threats. Google's 2024 Ads Safety Report offers a glimpse into the systems that help keep billions of people safe online—many without ever realising it. But for those who run small businesses, browse the web, or build tools and content that power Africa's digital economy, safety is not just technical—it's foundational. Copyright © 2022 Nigerian Tribune Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (
Forbes
16-04-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Google Boots 39 Million Accounts Using AI — What You Need To Know
Google uses AI to suspend millions of accounts. SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images There are two words that tend to send a shiver down my spine: Google and AI. Most often, that shiver is in response to an AI-powered threat, be it stealing passwords from Chrome or smartphone deepfake attacks. Sometimes, however, it is a shiver of excitement as Google strikes back against those who would hack or scam you with new protections for Gmail, Chrome, and Android users. I've just experienced one of those good shivers. Google has confirmed it's using AI to defend billions of users from millions of fraudulent accounts. Here is what you need to know. When it comes to attack distribution methodologies, malicious advertising has surely been one of the longest-running of all. Malvertising, to give it its somewhat too soft and fluffy name, is a curse that has been present pretty much since the first search engines appeared. Google, of course, is all too aware of this and has a team of more than 100 expert fraud fighters dedicated to developing countermeasures. Not all the experts on the front line of advertising fraud are human: AI has also joined the fight. The April 16 Google 'Ads Safety Report' for 2024 has revealed just how effective these AI defenses have been. 'In 2024, we launched over 50 enhancements to our Large Language Models,' Alex Rodriguez, Google's general manager of ads safety, said, 'which enabled more efficient and precise enforcement at scale.' Using AI to identify the fraud signals used by threat actors, including fraudulent payment information, during the account setup process has paid dividends. It has, Rodriguez confirmed, 'kept billions of policy-violating ads from ever showing to a consumer, while ensuring legitimate businesses can show ads to customers faster.' The numbers truly speak for themselves: 39.2 million advertising accounts suspended, 9.2 billion adverts restricted and 5.1 billion fraudulent adverts removed. The rise of AI-generated impersonation ads, especially those misrepresenting public figures in order to perpetuate a fraud, financial or otherwise, has rather ironically been tampered by AI itself. 'We were able to permanently suspend more than 700,000 offending advertiser accounts,' Rodriguez said, which led to 'a 90% drop in reports of this kind of scam ad last year.'
