According to the information provided, most of these businesses indulged in posting fake reviews on Google Maps to attract clients. And now, Google has begun taking action against these fake reviews too, which is impacting even legitimate businesses in India.
Google Maps is one resource that helps navigate through and discover new places. More people use it to read reviews before visiting the place. However, the ever-growing number of phony reviews done by businesses has been a cause for concern. In response to this, Google has implemented ways to make it easier to spot fake reviews. The tech giant started sending notices to businesses suspected of posting fake reviews and informing them that the reviews have been removed.
In the process, the UK-based Competition and Markets Authority or CMA investigated how tech companies deal with fake reviews last year. According to reports in Search Engine Roundtable, Google globally applies these rules as mentioned in its updated support page although an official announcement has not been made.
Reports from Indian companies say Google is doing this. Pallavi has a tiffin service in Jaipur. She says Google has deleted most of the pictures she had for her business, asking instead for more verification, including pictures of her staff, the cooking area, utensils, and other landmarks around. Pallavi finds it a rather inconvenient procedure for such a great decrease in new inquiries to affect her business negatively.
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Google has also disclosed possible penalties against businesses that violate its Fake Engagement policy. These could be a warning that appears in the business’s profile informing consumers that its fake reviews have been removed. Other possible restricted time measures include being unable to gain any new ratings or reviews or unpublishing existing ones. Google will then email the business owners and they can also appeal.
Meanwhile, Google recently announced that it will close millions of unused Gmail accounts. The firm made the announcement through a blog post, where it said many of the users haven’t used their Gmail accounts for such a long time. Google went on to explain that these accounts might be taking up space in the firms’ servers without any reason at all.
