In July, Google promised to rid their platform of criminals selling pill presses. How’s it going?
Google removed pill press advertisements and shopping listings referred to here from their platform after MassLive reporter Hadley Barndollar contacted them in preparation for "Google banned ads for deadly pill-making machines. They were still posted for sale — until a reporter asked," which was published on January 16.
Barndollar published an award-winning four-part series about pill presses in 2024. Read that coverage here: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4.
Background
Criminal organizations in the United States have been using pill presses to manufacture fentanyl pills that are indistinguishable from legitimate medications since at least 2015. The machines have fueled the counterfeit pill crisis, and their effects have been devastating. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that thousands of Americans die each year from counterfeit pills made with fentanyl and other illicit substances. In just 2024, the Drug Enforcement Administration seized over 55 million fentanyl-laced fake pills, and half of the pills the agency tested contained a fatal dose of fentanyl.
Public campaigns like the DEA’s One Pill Can Kill have helped raise awareness about these counterfeits, but they haven’t put a stop to pill production or pill press importation. Forfeiture records for the first half of 2025 show a substantial rise in pill presses and related parts seized by Customs and Border Protection.
Graph from PSM’s January–June 2025 pill press update.
How are the presses getting here? Sellers use third-party sales platforms and online advertising to direct buyers to their products. They have no compunction about selling to pill traffickers; they sidestep federal reporting requirements and falsify paperwork to avoid interdiction. In 2024, a federal grand jury charged a Chinese national with knowingly selling presses to U.S. residents who were making controlled substances as well as the counterfeit M30 pill molds that have become synonymous with fentanyl pills. She pleaded guilty to the charges and was sentenced to 52-months in prison in October 2025. In April 2025, they charged the company who employed the woman for the same activity.
Google saw the future and changed its ad policies. And yet pill press makers still advertise.
Federal authorities have also had some success holding online marketplaces accountable for enabling pill press distribution: In 2023, eBay paid $59 million to settle allegations under the Controlled Substances Act related to sales of pill presses on its platform. That settlement shows that allowing such listings presents a legal hazard for other online platforms, especially Google, which dominates the online advertising market. pulling in nearly $150 billion in ad revenue every year.
To its credit, Google announced in July that it would change its Merchant Center and Ads policies to prohibit listings of pill presses and related equipment, effective September 1, 2025. However, as of January 6, pill presses were still searchable on Google Shopping, returning images of sponsored products at the top of the search results for the less common term “tablet press,” and at least six companies were running advertising for pill press sales.
Screenshots from Google Ads and Google Shopping taken on January 6, 2026.
Google has the capacity to stop pill press ads and shopping listings, and if it follows through on its July announcement, it could have a substantial effect on the promotion of illicit pill press sales and set a precedent for other actors in the tech industry.
PSM calls upon Google to fulfill its commitment to public safety, to honor the thousands of grieving families in the U.S. who have buried loved ones who died from from fake pills, and to make good on their promise to rid the Google ad and shopping platforms of pill press sellers’ shopping listings and ads.