Google Messages RCS Is Being Abused For Ads In India (9to5google.com) 11
Over the past few weeks, Google Messages users in India have been reporting more and more ads showing up through RCS messaging. 9to5Google reports: While many brands -- even in the US and other countries -- have used messaging apps and SMS texts to advertise new products to former customers, these ads going on in India are not necessarily the result of a user's buying activity. Business messaging on RCS, as Google's Jibe website points out, is supposed to be used for things such as sending copies of your travel tickets or sending links for buying additional products based on a past purchase based on a user's request. [...] That is very much not what is happening in India right now.
Brought to our attention by Ishan Argwal on Twitter, RCS ads in Google Messages appear to be coming from "Verified Business" accounts. Google first announced that functionality back in 2020, for the purposes of allowing customers to talk to businesses. Advertising was surely part of the functionality, but it's clearly being abused in India. Android Police says these ads have been going out for almost a year now, citing examples of ads sent by Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bajaj Finserv, Buddy Loan, and PolicyBazaar. From what we can tell from user reports, it appears the frequency of these ads has been picking up over the past few months especially.
These ads are not harmless, either, with many of the examples we've seen being for personal loans, a category that tends to be full of predatory practices. One user reports that they were sent one of these ads on a phone that didn't even have an active SIM card in it. Currently, it seems as though this practice is primarily happening in the Indian market, at least in this quantity. What can be done about these ads in Google Messages? The solutions are all not quite ideal, unfortunately. You can report these businesses and block them from sending future messages [...]. Alternatively, you can turn off RCS features entirely within the Google Messages app.
Brought to our attention by Ishan Argwal on Twitter, RCS ads in Google Messages appear to be coming from "Verified Business" accounts. Google first announced that functionality back in 2020, for the purposes of allowing customers to talk to businesses. Advertising was surely part of the functionality, but it's clearly being abused in India. Android Police says these ads have been going out for almost a year now, citing examples of ads sent by Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bajaj Finserv, Buddy Loan, and PolicyBazaar. From what we can tell from user reports, it appears the frequency of these ads has been picking up over the past few months especially.
These ads are not harmless, either, with many of the examples we've seen being for personal loans, a category that tends to be full of predatory practices. One user reports that they were sent one of these ads on a phone that didn't even have an active SIM card in it. Currently, it seems as though this practice is primarily happening in the Indian market, at least in this quantity. What can be done about these ads in Google Messages? The solutions are all not quite ideal, unfortunately. You can report these businesses and block them from sending future messages [...]. Alternatively, you can turn off RCS features entirely within the Google Messages app.
I am sure Google will stomp on this hard and fast. (Score:2)
As they do not like others competing with them in annoying Ads.
RCS ?? (Score:2)
I want to know what RCS is, the only RCS I know about is GNU RCS, which I still use.
I did not read the article in true /. fashion, but I really wanted to say I am getting tired of these apps recycling perfectly good acronyms.
Re:RCS ?? (Score:4, Informative)
RCS isn't an app (kinda?), its a protocol similar to SMS (text messaging) and MMS (multimedia messages). RCS is "Rich Communication Services", which is the next evolution of SMS/MMS. Think like Apple's iMessage, but not locked down to any one given vendor or service provider. Google in their dumb shit selves decided to name one of their billions of messaging apps on Android as "RCS" because it supported the RCS protocol.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: RCS ?? (Score:2)
Re: RCS ?? (Score:2)
I was going to attempt a snarky joke (Score:2)
Advertising is cancer (Score:2)
If you leave an "emergency contact" method to a company, you can bet it will be used to send you ads, and it will also be sold to ad companies.
Ads spread to any communication channel it can reach, ad companies will leach any personal data it can find. Advertising industry is a cancer in the business world. It is long past due for the advertising industry to be regulated worldwide. GDPR is a right step, more steps should be taken.
Alternatively (Score:2)
> Alternatively, you can turn off RCS features entirely within the Google Messages app
Alternatively, you can uninstall the Google Messages app
FTFY
Why we can't have nice things (Score:2)
This