Thread: A Few Bad Apples Working at Google?

I just came across an interesting post on Problems.in, which claims that corrupt Google employees are accepting bribes for unbanning Google Adsense Accounts. Apparently, this information was publicly revealed on another forum by an "affiliate" of a Google employee.

Here is part of the email exchange published on the Problems.in blog post:

Hello,
$50 - $80 will be OK for a simple unban. Please send more details.
Regards

Sure I just want to let you know first of all before we proceed that there is a fee for this service. If you read my post carefully it just states that I am giving you a link to an adsense employee for free. However once I do get you transferred to the person who is actually giving you this service there is a fee for her service to you. For a simple unbann it would be around $50 - $80 depending on your situation. However please let me know what you are confortable spending budget is as I am able to change the prices around.

Also if you need adwords credits, I can get you $100 adwrods (Adwords) credits for $20 each.

No wonder the number of advertisers on the Google Adsense network are decreasing . If you are a honest publisher and do not wish to bribe Google employees, your account gets disabled.

If these claims are true, how widespread do you think the problem is? Do you think it's just a case of a few 'bad apples' working at Google? Too many bad apples can really hurt a company...

Bizarre. These are serious accusations! I wonder why this hasn't received more coverage?

Google posted 19% profit this Q .. despite bad apples !!!

@ Jeff - I agree - if individuals at Google have control to ban and unban - Google must investigate and come up clean with facts and suitable actions to throw the baddies out and re instill faith in publishers.

Agree that rectifying this problem should be a high-priority issue. If nothing else, Google should start an investigation into the accusation to identify if such a thing is possible based on their internal controls.

From my experience I can say that client information should typically be encrypted in a database and not easily accessible. Where access is provided it should be limited to a select section of support people and their access to such information should be logged, reviewed and audited. That is at least how it should be the process in a well controlled environment.

Apart from reputation damage to big G, such incidents can give raise to Government actions, censure etc., which are not good for the industry in general. Hope that beloved Google can root the rot quickly and thoroughly.