Google’s parent company, Alphabet Inc., filed a lawsuit against two people based in China for using the company’s platform for scam cryptocurrency apps that amassed over 100,000 downloads.
Google’s parent company claimed that scammers used its platforms, Google Play and YouTube, to upload and advertise fraudulent crypto apps.
The online giant alleged that the defendants engaged in a pattern of racketeering after committing hundreds of acts of wire fraud. The lawsuit was filed Thursday morning in a federal court in New York, according to an April 4 Bloomberg report.
The scam apps were designed to look like genuine digital asset investments, aiming to persuade users to deposit their funds, which users were never able to withdraw.
Despite Google continually taking fraudulent apps offline, many have bypassed its fraud detection systems. The two scammers first started uploading the racketeering apps in 2019.
The lawsuit is a crucial step for safeguarding the platform’s users, wrote Halimah DeLaine Prado, Google’s general counsel, according to the report:
“This litigation is a critical step in holding these bad actors accountable and sending a clear message that we will aggressively pursue those who seek to take advantage of our users.”
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This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.
