A multinational corporation like Google (or now Alphabet) is likely having lots of issues worth knowing.

There is simply no way to practice business around the world without breaking some things in the process.

Yet some corporations have a worse track record than others.

Google is not among the worst (think ExxonMobil, Nestle or Monsanto) but also not an innocent bystander.

I’ve been very critical of Google for a long time and collected a list of ethics issues they faced over the years.

Some of them are still problematic. Here they are.

When Google worked together with the Chinese regime

One of the first issues that showed me how Google is not really ethical was their cooperation with the Chinese regime.

After all it abused human rights in an anti-democratic country like China implementing censorship on a large scale.

I have a background in media activism among other influences so I know that

you do not ask multinational corporations to do something, you exert pressure on them.

One of the ways to do that is media exposure of their shortcomings. The more bad publicity the better.

We’ve seen several instances of it with the

• Coca Cola murders in Colombia
• Nike slave labor in Asia
• Apple toxic waste scandal

Some of Google’s scandals are still on the agenda.

At least for over a billion Chinese people there are good news. Google mostly pulled out of China over the years.

Yet they attempt to get a footing on the Chinese market frequently.

List of unethical practices Google is guilty of

Here is my list of issues for Google faced in the past or still does.

It’s far from complete and just some of the most known and obvious ones are listed.

As mentioned above Google censored search results in China.

Initially it was funded by a grant from US intelligence services NSA and CIA.

It is still collecting all available data about everybody, instead of a real commitment to privacy.

Google pleaded guilty for selling illegal drugs from Canada to US consumers.

Google’s Streetview cars unlawfully collected wifi usage data and even passwords from private networks a judge ruled in 2013.

In 2015 Google officially dropped the “do no evil” motto of the early years. They replaced it with a generic code of conduct.

Google faces an ongoing investigation over storing private user data from European fitbit users overseas.

Google illegally harvested and used users’ location data a court in Ireland has found.

For many years Google has avoided paying taxes. They paid under pressure of investigations in France, Italy, The UK or Ireland.

Google has stifled the competition in various cases and separate fines have been issued by EU authorities.

Google is officially a monopoly according to a US court ruling from 2024.

It illegally blocked the competition from accessing the markets they control.

Thus it has to pay the largest ever fine issued by antitrust regulators.

Google is liable for spreading fake claims via their AI summary features a German court declared.

Consider private alternatives

These are just some of the most obvious issues Google faces.

There is enough bad press already to consider alternatives that are more private.

That said it’s very hard to degoogle completely these days due to the ubiquitous presence of Google.

Yet you might want to at least occasionally use other tools and services for more sensitive information like trade secrets e.g.

Thus I use tools Startpage or Proton and the likes for more intimate communications when possible.