Google has suspended 39.2 million advertiser accounts in 2024—more than three times the number from the previous year. This increase is part of the company’s latest large-scale effort to fight ad fraud across its platforms.
Large language models (LLMs) have played a major role in these efforts by detecting suspicious signals such as impersonation and incorrect payment information. According to Google, the system is now capable of suspending the vast majority of ad accounts before their campaigns even go live. Over the past year, the company made more than 50 improvements to its LLMs, boosting the safety mechanisms used across all Google platforms.
To support this, a specialized team of over 100 experts was formed, bringing together members of the Ads Safety team, the Trust and Safety division, and DeepMind scientists. Together, they analyzed fake ad schemes—often involving altered images of celebrities—and built technical countermeasures. In addition to rolling out these tools, Google implemented over 30 policy changes for advertisers and platforms. As a result, over 700,000 abusive accounts were blocked, and user complaints about fake ads dropped by 90%.
Regional Impact and Key Violations
In the United States, 39.2 million advertiser accounts were blocked, along with the removal of 1.8 billion ads. The most common violations included abuse of the platform, trademark infringement, misleading health claims, misuse of ad personalization, and misrepresentation.
India, the world’s most populous country and the second-largest internet market by user count, ranked second after the US. Google blocked 2.9 million advertiser accounts and removed 247.4 million ads in India alone. Violations there mainly involved financial services, trademark issues, ad network abuse, personalization misuse, and gambling.
Election Year Measures and Fraud Prevention
In 2024—an election year in many countries—Google reviewed more than 8,900 new election-related advertisers and removed 10.7 million election ads. Overall, the company blocked 5.1 billion ads and removed 1.3 billion publisher pages last year. This marks a slight decrease from 2023, when 5.5 billion ads and 2.1 billion pages were removed, notes NIXSOLUTIONS. Google sees this drop as a sign of improved early prevention and detection, meaning fewer violations reach the platform in the first place.
Out of the total account suspensions, 5 million were tied to fraud-related activity. Additionally, the company blocked around half a billion ads for the same reason. Other restrictions were imposed on 9.1 billion ads globally.
While Google acknowledges the possibility of errors, it has an appeals system in place, with each case reviewed manually. We’ll keep you updated as more improvements and policy changes are rolled out.