Google complicit in UK premium rate phone number scams?

So you need a phone number fast right, and you know that if you call directory enquiries from your mobile or land line you are going to get charged for the call, so you Google the service you need,..

As an example let’s use the UK National Health Service direct health advice line, NHS Direct. This line is an 0845 number that’s free to call from a land line. You Google it and the first result is this site :

http://www.medhelpline.co.uk/nhsdirect.html

which offers to connect you to NHS Direct through an 0906 number which is actually PREMIUM RATED! (Only the words ‘premium rated’ do not appear anywhere near the number itself, Well you’d think that most people would not fall for this scam, but at 4am in the morning, perhaps your having palpitations? taken too much of your medication? or are having other symptoms that have you in a panic?)

Looking closer at the Google search we can see that the legitimate website entry NHS Direct, has been pre-empted by a paid avert which is barely distinguishable from the genuine search results. The scammers have used Google Adwords advertising to gazump the real service, and the spoof website even uses the same style as the legitimate one. This is just one example among many.

Now the question is , is Google aware that its adsense program is being exploited in this way or are they quite happy to continue making revenues from such scam advertising? The advertising that appears in your search results is clearly being deliberately disguised as a legitimate search result, google itself exploiting the tendency for users to take the first result in the list. And the next question to ask google is , what if any checking are they doing on sites advertised in this way?

If you have been scammed into calling a premium rate number you can report the scam to Actionfraud.org.uk