8 ms·

That sounds absolutely insane. Doesn't Google have any way to dispute the business ownership? Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a dom

by iakov 1y ago

That sounds absolutely insane. Doesn't Google have any way to dispute the business ownership? Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name?

mschuster91 1y ago
> Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name? yes, as long as the business doesn't have that already. And that's the point - many small restaurants, takeaways etc simply don't have a website because they think they don't need one, until they're fucked by Lieferando.
- Tade0 1y ago
  I googled the name as I was unfamiliar with it, but immediately recognized the orange logo in search results. Their entire business model seems to be centered around extorting businesses. I stopped giving them money after they inaccurately posted that a certain restaurant delivers to my location and got a phonecall from the place that this was the case so I agreed to pay extra to fulfill the order anyway, because Lieferando certainly wouldn't take responsibility. Nowadays I use them only for discovery, but call the place directly or use the webpage if the business provides online ordering. It appears that their initial value proposition to businesses was substituting delivery services so that restaurants could scale that up without hiring more staff. Of course enshittification made that service worse than just walking/driving/taking public transport there.
- Aerroon 1y ago
  But isn't that fraud? Lieferando is fraudulently pretending to be someone they aren't to profit from it.
  - mschuster91 1y ago
    They're following the usual VC pattern: it's more profitable to ask for forgiveness instead of approval. Plus, many restaurant owners are immigrants, and undocumented/underpaid labor is blooming as well. The last thing they want is to attract the eyes of the government.
vineyardmike 1y ago
> That sounds absolutely insane. It is absolutely insane that organizations are weaponizing this. > Doesn't Google have any way to dispute the business ownership? I can only speak for the US and it’s been a few years since I’ve done it, but yes Google does have a way. You can report an issue, and “claim” a business. Google will literally send a postcard with a unique ID to the registered physical address, and whoever gets that postcard can take ownership. > Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name? Absolutely not (at least legally I assume). It’s probably trademark infringement and potentially fraud to misrepresent that business, and also Google has other methods to verify ownership (see above).
- MichaelZuo 1y ago
  So then how can the scam work after the german restaurant gets the unique postcard?
  - conartist6 1y ago
    It certainly sounds like they would be sending it to the address provided by the scammer. The issue is their system assumes the first person to interact with it is trustworthy: gives a real phone number and address. If that first contact with Google was MITM'd, they seem to have no way to develop an un-compromised relationship with the real entity.
    - Propelloni 1y ago
      In Germany, everybody and their siblings usually ask for a recent copy of the trade certificate of registration--it actually is quite annoying. Google could do the same.
  - vineyardmike 1y ago
    I don't think it does. The postcard should go to the place where the customers go, so for a restaurant its the place with the tables and the food and stuff. If the address is different than the address of the shop-owner, then how would a user who uses google maps get to the shop? And why wouldn't the shop owner just create a new, correct listing?
fallinghawks 1y ago
A year or two ago when I was doing some searching in Maps for trails to hike in Hawaii, I noticed that if a trail didn't have an "official" website i.e. pointing to a local government page, in several cases a certain photographer had put his website into that spot. And later I discovered he had done this not only in Hawaii but several trails in Utah as well. It would not surprise me if he's hit up hundreds of trails for free advertising via Google's lack of vetting. I reported it, of course, (as someone else mentioned, Suggest an Edit) and they got changed, but I haven't checked to see if he changed them back.

by iakov 1y ago

That sounds absolutely insane. Doesn't Google have any way to dispute the business ownership? Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name?

mschuster91 1y ago

> Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name? yes, as long as the business doesn't have that already. And that's the point - many small restaurants, takeaways etc simply don't have a website because they think they don't need one, until they're fucked by Lieferando.

Tade0 1y ago
I googled the name as I was unfamiliar with it, but immediately recognized the orange logo in search results. Their entire business model seems to be centered around extorting businesses. I stopped giving them money after they inaccurately posted that a certain restaurant delivers to my location and got a phonecall from the place that this was the case so I agreed to pay extra to fulfill the order anyway, because Lieferando certainly wouldn't take responsibility. Nowadays I use them only for discovery, but call the place directly or use the webpage if the business provides online ordering. It appears that their initial value proposition to businesses was substituting delivery services so that restaurants could scale that up without hiring more staff. Of course enshittification made that service worse than just walking/driving/taking public transport there.
Aerroon 1y ago
But isn't that fraud? Lieferando is fraudulently pretending to be someone they aren't to profit from it.
- mschuster91 1y ago
  They're following the usual VC pattern: it's more profitable to ask for forgiveness instead of approval. Plus, many restaurant owners are immigrants, and undocumented/underpaid labor is blooming as well. The last thing they want is to attract the eyes of the government.

vineyardmike 1y ago

> That sounds absolutely insane. It is absolutely insane that organizations are weaponizing this. > Doesn't Google have any way to dispute the business ownership? I can only speak for the US and it’s been a few years since I’ve done it, but yes Google does have a way. You can report an issue, and “claim” a business. Google will literally send a postcard with a unique ID to the registered physical address, and whoever gets that postcard can take ownership. > Can I take over any business on the maps by just registering a domain that contains the business name? Absolutely not (at least legally I assume). It’s probably trademark infringement and potentially fraud to misrepresent that business, and also Google has other methods to verify ownership (see above).

MichaelZuo 1y ago
So then how can the scam work after the german restaurant gets the unique postcard?
- conartist6 1y ago
  It certainly sounds like they would be sending it to the address provided by the scammer. The issue is their system assumes the first person to interact with it is trustworthy: gives a real phone number and address. If that first contact with Google was MITM'd, they seem to have no way to develop an un-compromised relationship with the real entity.
  - Propelloni 1y ago
    In Germany, everybody and their siblings usually ask for a recent copy of the trade certificate of registration--it actually is quite annoying. Google could do the same.
- vineyardmike 1y ago
  I don't think it does. The postcard should go to the place where the customers go, so for a restaurant its the place with the tables and the food and stuff. If the address is different than the address of the shop-owner, then how would a user who uses google maps get to the shop? And why wouldn't the shop owner just create a new, correct listing?

fallinghawks 1y ago

A year or two ago when I was doing some searching in Maps for trails to hike in Hawaii, I noticed that if a trail didn't have an "official" website i.e. pointing to a local government page, in several cases a certain photographer had put his website into that spot. And later I discovered he had done this not only in Hawaii but several trails in Utah as well. It would not surprise me if he's hit up hundreds of trails for free advertising via Google's lack of vetting. I reported it, of course, (as someone else mentioned, Suggest an Edit) and they got changed, but I haven't checked to see if he changed them back.