Google is suing an online seller for violating its terms of service and to prevent the defendant from further harming Google, as well as business owners and consumers.
The defendant was a member of a public Facebook group called Rank and Rent – GMB Strategy & Domination.
The lawsuit claims the company has misled users, engaged in activities that violate federal and state laws, and breached its contract with Google as set forth in its terms of service.
There are three main schemes the defendants are accused of:
“(1) fraudulent verification of non-existent business profiles,
(2) post false reviews on business profiles and
(3) sell genuine business opportunities to unsuspecting customers seeking services from the companies listed in defendants’ false business profiles. “
The two sued entities are GMBEye and Rafadigital, which Google links as a single company.
Rank and rent
Listing and Renting is a practice where someone will create a business website and associated business profile for the purpose of selling us leads, renting it to a business for a certain price, or selling the profile and site company website.
This practice gained prominence around 2019.
Remarkably, demonstrating the level of naïveté (lack of wisdom, experience or judgment) of those involved in rank and hire, professionals operate an open-air public Facebook page to discuss the strategies and sale of advertising their websites and business profiles.
Google’s lawsuit includes a screenshot of this public Facebook group, with a description of the defendant claiming to “rent GMB” and “sell GMB”
The defendant was in a Rank and Rent Facebook group that stated that it rents Google business profiles and sells them, which is part of what Rank and Rent is.
Screenshot of Rank and Rent Facebook Group posted on Google Demand
Screenshot published on demand by Google
The claim describes the business practice:
“Once the defendants successfully verify these fictitious business profiles, they proceed to either sell the listing or alter the fake business information to make the business profile more desirable to potential buyers.
Defendants sometimes transfer control of fraudulently verified business profiles, updated to include business information from an unverified real-world company, to their buyers.”
Google Business Profile Verification Service
One of the services the company offered was Google Business Profile Verification Services as well as the most promising listings.
According to Google:
“GMBEye is replete with express and implied guarantees that Defendants can bypass the verification procedures that Google requires of most merchants, and also to ensure that a particular business listing is “at the top” of Google’s results. Google Search: A misleading and false statement, because no company or entity can guarantee this location using Google’s search algorithm.
Much of the Defendants’ messages suggest that GMBEye has preferential access to Google or that it has a unique position vis-à-vis Google that allows it to secure “Premium Business Listing Verification” that is not available to those verifying your businesses through Google’s free processes.
…GMBEye customers and potential customers likely include both legitimate merchants looking for a shortcut through Google’s procedures, as well as other scammers or bad actors abusing fake business listings; while the latter may quickly recognize GMBEye as a fellow scammer, the former may not.”
The lawsuit makes statements about the website’s messages suggesting they have “a proprietary process” for establishing trust with Google, which allows them to “expedite” the process.
There are also descriptions of the extraordinary demands made by the defendant.
According to demand:
“An additional explanation on the GMBEye website boasts that the defendants can even verify the companies with [s]pammy names,” suggesting the service circumvents Google’s measures to maintain accurate and high-quality business profiles.
Defendants also claim that “[m]Most verification methods cannot [sic] handle it because Google will suspend your listing, but with our method you can sustainably rank your GMBs with spammy names that will help you rank on Google in no time!
GMB profiles and fake reviews
The lawsuit claims the defendant offers to improve Google Maps and “GMB” profile listings and “encouraging reviews.”
It also claims that the company claims to be able to rank clients #1, which is generally known in the search marketing industry as a red flag because no one can guarantee such a thing.
Generation of leads
The defendants, according to the lawsuit, advertised themselves as specializing in lead generation, which means driving sales calls and leads, sales leads, to businesses, which is part of the practice known as Rank and Rent.
The lawsuit says:
“Rafadigital claims it can”[g]and high-converting leads straight to your phone” “for all industries[.]””
Google describes the classification and rental regime
The lawsuit provides a description of how the defendants operated their scheme.
They write:
“… Defendants first create a company profile for a fake business, usually accompanied by a fake website based on a simple template.
Defendants typically associate these bogus companies with Voice over Internet Protocol (“VoIP”) telephone numbers whose area codes correspond to the bogus companies’ purported locations.
On information and belief, the defendants have been associated with more than 350 fake business profile listings since mid-2021.”
How Defendants Tricked Google’s Verification System
Google’s verification system was surprisingly easy to bypass.
The defendant appears to have made little effort to create photos and videos to show that they are a real business, sometimes using the same tool bank, photographed from different angles, to show that they were a business.
A video screenshot included in the lawsuit shows the image of the person Google says is “believed to be associated with a non-existent chiropractor, Wilmington Chiro Health.”
This was used as part of the non-existent chiropractor verification process.
The lawsuit also publishes images provided by the defendant during the course of verification of a company called “Garage Door Repair of West Los Angeles.”
This is the image provided by the defendant to “fool” Google into believing it was a workspace image.
The following is the image provided to Google for verification by a “Pro Tree Service” from Houston, Texas, showing the exact same tool bank:
Google’s lawsuit provides another image that the defendants used to verify “AS Budget Plumbers, allegedly based in Davis, California, when the defendants contacted Google to verify this fake listing on March 29, 2022:”
Rank and Rent – GMB Strategy and Domination Facebook Group
Google’s lawsuit names a Facebook group called Rank and Rent – GMB Strategy & Domination as a site the defendant used to sell business listings.
The lawsuit describes the process:
“For example, Mr. Hu posted the following offer to sell a business listing in a Facebook group called “Rank and Rent – GMB Strategy & Domination,” stating that his listing for a “Plumbing GMB + Website” in Monterey, California, had received “~40 calls and 5 form submissions” in the previous month, presumably from Monterey area residents seeking help with a plumbing problem.”
According to demand:
“Mr. Hu admits in his bio on GMBEye.com “rent GMB” and “GMB sale“- sought $1000 for the company profile of this non-existent company.”
Fake Google Profile Reviews
The defendant is also accused of selling fake reviews that Google claims were outsourced to fake review providers in Bangladesh and Vietnam.
According to the demand
“To further bolster the illusions of legitimacy and credibility of their fake listings, and as an added service to their buyers, the defendants have the fake reviews posted on their fraudulent business profiles and transferred to their customers.
… Upon information and belief, the defendants are connected to a network of more than 350 fraudulent business profiles that include at least 14,000 false reviews.
Almost all reviews awarded a potential five stars.
And most of those reviews, including the at least 14,000 reviews mentioned above, were posted by two actors located in Bangladesh and Vietnam, an ocean away from the many alleged US companies for which these accounts posted reviews.” .
Damages requested by Google
Google is suing defendants participating in the rank and file scheme for triple the amount of actual damages, attorneys’ fees and prejudgment interest.
A Cornell University Law School website describe the meaning of prejudgment interest:
“The interest that a creditor, usually the plaintiff in the case, is entitled to collect, derived from the amount of a judgment, which compensates the creditor for an injury that occurred before the judgment.
… Another example is Short v. US, where the Federal Circuit awarded the Yurok Indians prejudgment interest on their damages to recover income generated by the harvesting of timber from which they were wrongfully excluded.”
Google Terms of Service
Some people are uncomfortable about violating Google’s terms of service, and they naively believe that Google is not the law.
Some marketers naively treat Google’s Terms of Service without the seriousness they deserve.
Google is suing the defendant for breach of contract for violating these terms of service related to Google Maps and Google Business Profiles.
What this lawsuit makes clear is that violating Google’s terms of service is not to be taken lightly.
As you can see with this lawsuit, Google has the right to enforce its terms of service in court.
Read the text of Google’s lawsuit (PDF)
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