Google has finally taken action to remove unauthorised ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorisation) ads which appear on its site. The ads are most often over-priced ways for users to apply for the U.S. travel authorisation, which is available from the U.S. government at $14.
These ads break google's terms of use, which doesn't permit such ads: "charging for products or services where the primary offering is available from a government or public source for free or at a lower price".
The company says it's using machine learning to deal with the ads, rather than relying on manual processes to remove the ads.
The search ads will no longer appear above the official site in the SERPs, however, it doesn't stop sites appearing lower down the SERPs than the official site.
Google will now be employing the machine learning to deal with similar ads in other markets.
[
bbc.co.uk...]
