Google said Friday it was banning online ads for unproven medical treatments including most stem cell and gene rapy.

"This new policy will prohibit ads selling treatments that have established biomedical or scientific basis," Google policy adviser Adrienne Biddings said in a blog post.

Biddings said Google will "prohibit advertising for unproven or experimental medical techniques such as most stem cell rapy, cellular (n-stem) rapy and gene rapy." Google will also ban "treatments that are rooted in basic scientific findings and preliminary clinical experience, but currently have insufficient formal clinical testing to justify widespread clinical use," she added. online giant said it made decision due to "a rise in bad actors attempting to take advant of individuals by offering untested, deceptive treatments." company said this was t an effort to diminish importance of medical discoveries but maintained that "monitored, regulated clinical trials are most reliable way to test and prove important medical advances." Google said it took action after consulting experts in field and that its move was endorsed by president of International Society for Stem Cell Research, Deepak Srivastava.

READ | Google Assistant comes to more speakers, headphones at IFA 2019

Google statement

In Google's statement, Srivastava was quoted as saying, " premature marketing and commercialisation of unproven stem cell products threatens public health, ir confidence in biomedical research, and undermines development of legitimate new rapies." Online services have struggled to filter out misleading and deceptive content, including medical hoaxes, while remaining open platforms. Earlier this year Facebook and Google-owned YouTube moved to reduce spread of misleading health care claims after a media report showed proliferation of bogus cancer cures on social media. Facebook said it made changes as part of efforts to reduce spread of misleading medical claims including from groups opposing use of recommended vaccines. A Wall Street Journal report, based on interviews with doctors, lawyers, privacy experts and ors, found numerous false or misleading claims about cancer rapies online. se included videos advocating use of potentially dangerous cell-killing ointments, unverified dietary regimes, or unapproved screening techniques.