Google has already started its crackdown on Cryptocurrency ads. The internet giant first announced that it will be discontinuing ads related to cryptocurrency starting from July this year. The meteoric rise in the value and the relevancy of cryptocurrency has given rise to many early adopters who mine their way to riches. Companies have been offering cloud-based crypto mining tool and some of them also promise to pay a “rent” for your unused computing power. Amidst all the hoopla the unregulated cryptocurrency industry has witnessed a ton of scams and Ponzi schemes like the Bitconnect.
Google has now announced that it will no longer accept extensions that contain cryptocurrency mining scripts. The extensions that are already present in the Chrome web store will be removed in late June. As of now, Google’s policy states that the sole purpose of the extensions has to be mining and the developers should be upfront about this. However, as per Google’s research 90 percent of the extensions failed to comply with the policy.
That being said, other useful cryptocurrency extensions that let you check your crypto portfolio value and wallet managers will not be removed. Google will apparently draw a line between extensions that are used to mine cryptocurrencies and the ones that are used for managing the crypto portfolio and check real-time price.
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Jams Wagner, Extensions Platform Product Manager at Google was quoted as follows “Over the past few months, there has been a rise in malicious extensions that appear to provide useful functionality on the surface while embedding hidden cryptocurrency mining scripts that run in the background without the user’s consent.” he further added that “These mining scripts often consume significant CPU resources, and can severely impact system performance and power consumption.”
Google taking a tough stance on cryptocurrency might appear as a knee-jerk reaction but according to me, it isn’t such. The cryptocurrency ecosystem is being dominated by fake Ponzi schemes and fly by night operators who promise “millions” and “billions.” I am convinced that Google will remove the blanket of restriction over cryptocurrency once the market matures.
