Google has filed a lawsuit against rogue pharmacies that carry out online sales of drugs illegally to stop such entities from advertising with the Internet major.
The lawsuit comes against the backdrop of rising instances of drugs sold illegally without prescriptions on the Internet.
According to Google, rogue online pharmacies always try new tactics to get around those protections and illegally sell drugs on the web.
"... we (have) filed a civil lawsuit in (US) federal court against advertisers we believe have deliberately broken our rules," Google's Litigation Counsel Michael Zwibelman said in a blog post on late Tuesday.
He noted that despite best efforts, a small percentage of pharma advertisements from these rogue companies is still appearing on Google.
Pointing out that there has been a marked increase in the number of rogue pharmacies online, Zwibelman stressed that such litigation should act as a serious deterrent to anyone thinking about circumventing our policies to advertise illegally on Google.
"Rogue pharmacies are bad for our users, for legitimate online pharmacies and for the entire e-commerce industry so we are going to keep investing time and money to stop these kinds of harmful practices," the blog post said.
For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.