Google to ban ads promoting COVID-19 conspiracy theories

Google is said to ban from next month the publishers from using its ad platform to show advertisements next to content that promotes conspiracy theories about pandemic. It will also ban ads that promote those theories. In cases where a particular site publishes a certain threshold of material that violates these policies, it will ban the entire site from using its ad platforms.

Tech giant Google already prohibits ads from running against content that makes harmful claims about disease prevention and unsubstantiated cures, including anti-vaccine promotions or content that encourages users to forgo treatment.

The company is now taking a step further and banning ads against content that make claims going against authoritative scientific consensus. Banned claims would include conspiracy theories like vaccines being attempts to genetically modify the population, that Bill Gates created Covid-19 or that the disease was a bio weapon made in a Chinese lab. 

Google will begin enforcing the change on Aug. 18, and can remove ads from single articles or, in some cases, entire sites. When it comes to removing ads from an entire site, the company said for most of its policies it has a percentage threshold for policy violations before it will fully demonetize a website. (The violation of some policies, like one preventing child sex abuse material, is considered by the company to be so egregious that they result in immediate site-level action).

The news comes the same week as a news channel first reported that Google had begun running ads again on financial market website Zero Hedge. In mid-June, Google said it had taken action against Zero Hedge because of the comments section of the site, which Google said consistently violated its policy against dangerous and derogatory material. Google said Zero Hedge appealed the demonetization after deciding to remove the content and implementing comment moderation.