Google: billions of bad ads, $135M Android deal

Google says its latest ad crackdown blocked or removed more than 8.3 billion rule-breaking ads in 2025 and suspended 24.9 million advertiser accounts. (blog.google.com) The company published those figures on April 16 in its 2025 Ads Safety Report, which also says more than 99% of policy-violating ads were stopped before they ever ran. Google said Gemini, its newer artificial intelligence model, helped review ads faster and spot intent instead of just keywords. (blog.google.com) (services.google.com) Google’s report says 602 million ads and 4 million advertiser accounts were tied to scams, 4.8 billion ads were restricted, and enforcement touched more than 480 million web pages and 245,000 publisher sites. The company also said Gemini-driven systems cut incorrect advertiser suspensions by 80% last year. (services.google.com) Online ad policing has turned into an arms race as scammers use generative artificial intelligence to mass-produce fake storefronts, impersonation campaigns, and bait-and-switch offers. Google said its newer models now analyze signals such as account age, behavior patterns, and campaign structure to catch abuse before ads reach users. (blog.google.com) At the same time, Google is dealing with a separate privacy fight over what Android phones were allegedly sending back to the company in the background. A federal settlement site says users who accessed the internet on Android over a cellular network from November 12, 2017 onward may be covered by a $135 million class-action deal, with California users carved out because a separate state case already settled. (federalcellularclassaction.com) (classaction.org) The lawsuit, Taylor v. Google LLC, alleged Android devices transferred data to Google over paid cellular connections even when phones were idle, apps were closed, and Wi‑Fi was available. Google denied wrongdoing, and the settlement resolves the case without a trial verdict on the merits. (classaction.org) (usatoday.com) Settlement trackers and news reports say the proposed deal would provide prorated cash payments capped at $100 per class member, though actual payouts will depend on how many people qualify and participate. Reports on the case also say Google agreed to update disclosures in Android setup screens, Google Play terms, and help materials as part of the agreement. (classaction.org) (theclassactionlawsuit.com) Taken together, the two developments show Google tightening one side of its platform while paying to resolve claims about another. In ads, the company says artificial intelligence is filtering more abuse before anyone sees it; in Android, the question is whether users were told clearly enough about background data transfers in the first place. (blog.google.com) (federalcellularclassaction.com)