Scammers are using the Google Maps contributor program to upload AI-generated photos with phone numbers, tricking users into calling the number in the photo instead of the number on the Google Business Profile listing. These scammers are doing this across dozens, if not, hundreds of Google Business Profile listings and reporting them to Google seems to be doing nothing.
So the searcher will think they are calling the business that they are looking at but in fact, they are calling a scammer instead.
This is not necessarily a new spam / fraud technique but I don't think I've covered it before.
Sam Sarsten posted about this on LinkedIn and said Naomi Stevens posted the details of this in a LinkedIn group. She wrote:
A Google Maps contributor has uploaded an AI-generated image to my client's GBP (roofing company) using the client's business name but with a phone number that doesn't belong to the business. What makes this worse is that Google is displaying the it prominently on the profile so it almost looks like a cover image or profile pic!I checked the contributor and they have 150+ photo contributions to unrelated businesses across the US, with the same incorrect phone number appearing on images for other businesses too. It looks like systematic spam intended to redirect calls.
We've reported the image, and I've also contacted Google support, but the response was:
From the info you shared, we're not sure of your exact issue, but here are solutions to the most common issues… (none of them relevant!)
I’ve also added more images, added a logo and cover image, hoping this would bury the image, but none of them are replacing the fake image.
Has anyone encountered this before? If so, how did you get the image/contributor removed, or successfully escalate it with Google? Or how long did it take for the image to be removed? I have added a screenshot of the image.
This specific scammer may be going under the name Jack Edward and he uploads these photos to Google business listings:
They all have the same phone number, so technically, Google can run it through some sort of AI to find all of these and quickly remove them.
But it seems these scams aren't getting caught quickly enough, and the scammers are banking on Google's spam team not responding.
Forum discussion at LinkedIn.
