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Google recognizes the importance of trademarks. The Google Ads Terms and Conditions prohibit intellectual property infringement. Advertisers are solely responsible for the keywords and ad content they use.
We take allegations of trademark infringement very seriously and, as a courtesy, we investigate valid trademark complaints submitted by trademark owners or their authorized agents. However, Google is not in a position to mediate third party disputes, and we encourage trademark owners to resolve their disputes directly with advertisers.
In addition to directly contacting advertisers, trademark owners who are concerned about trademark use in ads can follow the steps below to submit a complaint.
Submit a trademark complaint
We won't restrict the use of your trademark unless you submit a valid complaint. Trademark owners don’t need to be Google Ads advertisers to submit a complaint. Here are the steps to do so:
Verify that you are eligible to submit a complaint.
We generally accept complaints from:
Trademark owners. Your email address domain must match a corporate domain or website. If you do not have a corporate email address, you will need to provide a PDF of a signed statement on company letterhead confirming that you are an employee of the trademark owner.
Attorneys of Record as listed on trademark registrations. Your email address domain must match your or your law firm’s website.
For us to accept complaints from any other contacts (such as attorneys not listed on trademark registrations, media agencies, or licensed partners and distributors), trademark owners must provide explicit authorization for these entities to act on their behalf. When submitting the complaint form, you will need to attach either a power of attorney or a signed statement from the trademark owner on their company letterhead that confirms that you are authorized to act on their behalf regarding trademark matters. The authorization should not include conditions such as an expiration date, territorial restrictions, or other limitations.
- Review the Trademarks policy and make sure that you understand what we will and won’t investigate.
Submit the Trademark complaint form.
Additional informationTo ensure efficient review of your complaint, please provide all requested information. We won’t be able to take action on incomplete complaints.
Because trademark rights are territorial, we'll only investigate the use of your trademark in regions you specify, where you own active trademark rights. The process to acquire trademark rights, either through registration or use, varies from region to region. Google doesn’t register trademarks.
You can choose to request an investigation only of ads by specific advertisers that you identify, or of ads by all relevant advertisers except those that you authorize.
After submitting the complaint form, you'll receive an auto-generated confirmation email. After we review your complaint, we'll send a response to the email address you provided letting you know the outcome of our review.
We receive a high volume of complaints and review them in the order that they are received. Please be assured that we will contact you after we have reviewed your complaint. If you have questions related to your complaint, reply to the auto-generated confirmation email you received upon submission. Do not resubmit your complaint or follow up in separate emails.
Authorize advertisers to use your trademark
If you have a trademark complaint on file, you can authorize advertisers to use your trademark by submitting the authorization form. However, authorization isn't necessary in most scenarios. Ads may use trademarks in ad text if they meet the Reseller and informational site policy requirements. Please carefully review this policy before submitting the authorization form.
Additional informationOnly the trademark owner or their authorized agent(s) can authorize advertisers to use their trademark.
Authorizations are limited to Google Ads accounts, so you must provide the customer ID of each advertiser that you would like to authorize. Any manager accounts will automatically have authorization extended to all current and future linked accounts.
We are unable to accept conditional authorizations that include an expiration date, territorial restrictions, or other limitations.
Authorizations apply to all trademarks and variations included in the trademark owner's complaints on file; they cannot be limited to certain trademarks or variations, even if the trademark owner submitted the original complaints separately.
You may revoke authorization at any time by submitting the authorization form and noting in the "Clarifications" section of the form that your request is an authorization revocation.
Ads from resellers and informational sites
Please keep in mind that after we complete a trademark investigation, ads using the trademark in ad text may still be allowed to run if they meet the Reseller and informational site policy requirements.
We believe the right approach is to give users more choices and access to as much information as is relevant to their search or interest. This policy balances the needs of our users while ensuring that noncompliant uses of the trademark in ad text continue to be investigated and restricted according to our Trademarks policy.
Counterfeit goods and Copyrights policies
We have separate complaint procedures for issues related to counterfeit goods and copyrights.
If your complaint relates to counterfeit goods, please review the Counterfeit goods policy and complaint procedure.
If your complaint relates to copyrights, please review the Copyrights policy and complaint procedure.