Google Defrauds Advertisers, Report Claims

Google and its partners are turning traffic that advertisers would have received for free into paid traffic and collecting the proceeds, claims Benjamin Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School, in a report.

"Google and its partners systematically inflate advertisers' conversion rates by interceding in transactions advertisers would otherwise have received for free," Edelman's report states. "This conversion-inflation syndication fraud overstates the true effectiveness of the ads Google delivers -- leading advertisers to pay more than they should."

Google's Chrome browser appears to be designed to encourage users to search -- for which Google may be paid -- rather than navigate directly.