INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Marketing Federation Limited (GCMMF), which owns dairy brand Amul, has sent a legal notice to Google India on fraudulent practices it claims
to have found being carried out by individuals and organisations using latter's platform.The notice was issued to Google India Pvt Ltd on
January 10 regarding individuals/organisations using Google platform for fraudulent practices, according to an official statement on
Wednesday.Google India operates as a non-exclusive re-seller of Google LLC's AdWords program in India."They (Google) have benefited from
Google Search advertising campaigns, which are being misused to scam innocent individuals in name of Amul in India," GCMMF managing director
RS Sodhi said.The statement said a series of fake business-to-business (B2B) campaigns regarding "Amul Parlors, Distributors" was being
circulated through fake websites using Google Search ads since September 2018.These made fake promises of a business opportunity with Amul
"Many Indians across geography of India and age group have been robbed of their hard earned money," Mr Sodhi asserted.Amul stated that it
had raised this issue with Google India and had sought their help to stop miscreants from using their platform through paid
advertisements."It has been observed, Google Ads platform is allowing such miscreants to use its paid promotion services repeatedly without
any background checks and in process earning revenues from click based advertising on their page," Amul statement said."This has led Amul to
issue a legal notice to Google India and goDaddy.com for holding them accountable for misuse of their platform and earning revenues through
advertisements (subscription in case ofAgodaddy.com) on their platform on account of innocent individuals across India," it added.Amul ran a
promoted ad on Google Search to educate customers against such fake campaigns, and had created a dedicated page about it.
