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Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

danfabulich.medium.com

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Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#111

Post by andi999 »

cookiengineer wrote: post #66
CGamesPlay wrote: post #7

I'd extend this even further: never use a single account for more than one purpose. Create a separate account at the same company for the other purpose. Some examples: - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. - Nothing tied to your consumer accounts should be used for anything business related. - Your Amazon shopping account and your AWS account should defin…

Can confirm this solid advice. Even at a mega-scale social games publisher like Zynga, we had to deal with automated bans all the time. That's why at one point we used an avatar for each game that was separately managed and was basically a separate identity with a separate bank account with a holding company etc. - Invent an avatar that has their own profile, residence, birth date, gender etc. - Use separate email ad…

How do you make an avatar with a bank account?

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#112

Post by inopinatus »

genuine_smiles wrote: post #26
CGamesPlay wrote: post #7

I'd extend this even further: never use a single account for more than one purpose. Create a separate account at the same company for the other purpose. Some examples: - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. - Nothing tied to your consumer accounts should be used for anything business related. - Your Amazon shopping account and your AWS account should defin…

> - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. I wouldn’t do this with Facebook. Creating a second account is against Facebook policy, and they may ban both accounts.

Facebook's demand is this brain-damaged garbage:

If you want to represent your business, organisation, brand or product on Facebook, you can use your personal account to create and manage a Page.

We have a diametrically conflicting policy, by which personal accounts absolutely may not be used to manage company resources, for exactly the aforementioned reasons of minimising blast radius; so, we basically gave up on Facebook.

The double standard is evident: can you imagine any FAANG security team allowing a major corporate communications channel to be owned by a personal account? Answer: no; because doing something that fucking stupid would be a disciplinary offence.

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#113

Post by dgs_sgd »

privacyking wrote: post #103
CGamesPlay wrote: post #7

I'd extend this even further: never use a single account for more than one purpose. Create a separate account at the same company for the other purpose. Some examples: - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. - Nothing tied to your consumer accounts should be used for anything business related. - Your Amazon shopping account and your AWS account should defin…

Even if you use separate accounts, Google can and has banned all associated accounts (including personal accounts) in the past.

What do you mean by associated accounts? How does Google know they are linked?

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#114

Post by dangero »

KorematsuFred wrote: post #69
CGamesPlay wrote: post #7

I'd extend this even further: never use a single account for more than one purpose. Create a separate account at the same company for the other purpose. Some examples: - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. - Nothing tied to your consumer accounts should be used for anything business related. - Your Amazon shopping account and your AWS account should defin…

This in general is sound advice however most large cos will have the ability to detect cluster of ids that are owned by same person. - Beware of impersonation. It is a felony offense. When you create accounts give the same first name and last name. There are many forms where you have to answer questions like "Have you ever used any other alias?". While 99% of times it is fine, there are rare cases where you might get…

Can you elaborate on how people got busted for an alias?

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#115

Post by vineyardmike »

nawgz wrote: post #92
paxys wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I get what you are saying, this is sounding more and more like an abusive relationship. "Getting beaten by your husband? Try not being around him when he is drunk." At some point we have to face the reality that the tech ecosystem needs some serious fixing, for both consumers and developers.

Since when have we not looked at capitalist entities as abusers and exploiters? No one wants to be in this situation wrt megacorps and their stranglehold on the internet, free speech, and so many livelihoods. Putting the onus on consumers to fix this is hilarious and naive.

While I agree that the onus should not be on consumers, it’s generally not bad advice to say “avoid those who abuse you”. it would be better, of course, to say “avoid those who abuse you… but I’ll be trying to protect you”

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#116

Post by [deleted] »

jraph wrote: post #85
themolecularman wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there's a good alternative never use Google anything. Brave instead of Chrome. Duck Duck Go instead of Google. Proton Mail instead of Gmail. The only thing I haven't been able to replace is YouTube. That's a tricky one because it's the content creators that keep me locked into it.

> The only thing I haven't been able to replace is YouTube. That's a tricky one because it's the content creators that keep me locked into it. Yes, this is a pain. At least YouTube does not require an account and you can use it through Invidious (or NewPipe on Android, or mpv/youtube-dl on Linux if you already have the YouTube link). > Brave instead of Chrome. Brave is Chrome repackaged. This a bit feels like "I avoi…

[deleted]

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#117

Post by Fezzik »

echelon wrote: post #89
o-__-o wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Creating a subsidiary business for every type of Google account you have would be quite expensive Costs roughly $1000/yr to run a properly sheltered LLC. Just saying, that’s a low barrier to overcome for any company turning modest revenue.

> Costs roughly $1000/yr to run a properly sheltered LLC. Just saying, that’s a low barrier to overcome for any company turning modest revenue. I'm paying $200ish annually in Georgia. Am I missing some major filing requirement? This is a big discrepancy.

OP was including other base fees beyond just the registration fee. The registration fee is $50-$500 annually depending on the state. With most states charging $250 or less.

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#118

Post by speeder »

j_barbossa wrote: post #64

Imagine this would be the case for physical stores and only 2 companies in the world could decide what products you are allowed to sell. You start a coffee shop and 1 day later a representative of company X walks in and shuts down your entire store because you "violated our conditions but we won't tell you which one. You can beg us to reopen your store but first you have to tell us why you didn't violate our policies…

I know a board game shop owner that had this issue... He was specialized in a certain card game I won't name, and one of their employees had shares of the biggest shop in the country, and then by "coincidence" all shops that competed with that big shop, but weren't big enough to defend themselves, kept losing access to products, and kept being banned from hosting tournaments, because they violated some policy that there was no explanation, and the only way to get accepted back was convince the manufacturer of the game that they didn't violated the policy... whatever policy it was.

It only stopped after a regular couldn't buy his favourite product, got pissed, and threatened to sue the manufacturer, that regular is a star lawyer so the manufacturer finally understood they faced a real threat now.

Re: Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads

#119

Post by dheera »

CGamesPlay wrote: post #7

I'd extend this even further: never use a single account for more than one purpose. Create a separate account at the same company for the other purpose. Some examples: - Every product/project you manage should be on a separate account on Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. - Nothing tied to your consumer accounts should be used for anything business related. - Your Amazon shopping account and your AWS account should defin…

> account siloing very likely would have avoided the issue

Not necessarily, if your personal@gmail.com and business@corp.com Gmail accounts almost always access Google from the same Comcast IP address, from the same Wi-Fi BSSID, and awake/active at similar hours, Google could easily tell these two accounts are likely the same person.

AFAIK AdSense also tries to detect forms of click fraud where you ask people in your network to help you click ads, and I can only imagine they can do that because know who you have e-mailed before, whose phone contacts you have, and who you have had calendar events or Hangouts with before.

Banning apps with no recourse or appeal process, however, should really be illegal. They could easily bankrupt certain small businesses and livelihoods from their rash algorithmic decisions.

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