Reed had inadvertently stumbled into a cottage industry of sites that charge high premiums for what are otherwise free or inexpensive government services. It’s an industry that continues to use Google’s ad section, despite blatantly violating Google’s stated policies, and in some cases, the law.
Google’s ad policy states, “Promotions for assistance with applying or paying for official services that are directly available via a government or government delegated provider” aren’t allowed. Yet The Markup found a swath of examples of ads that appear to do just that.
Google has “removed all of these ads for violating our policies,” Google spokesperson Christa Muldoon said, after The Markup provided the company with the ads. “We prohibit ads that mislead users by implying an affiliation with a government agency.”
Muldoon didn’t respond to a question about why the ads were able to violate Google’s policy.
Along with the site that fooled Reed, Tax Filing Forms also operates irs.gov-taxnumber.com—a URL that contains “irs.gov” but isn’t affiliated with the IRS. The Markup found ads for that site on Google in search results for “how to get ein.” Tax Filing Forms’ websites share the subdued design of government websites—enough that Reed didn’t pick up on what happened until her banker raised a red flag over a multiday wait time. (The IRS provides EINs right away.)