Google Takes Action Against Pixel Resellers
Google has taken action against 200 owners of their new Pixel smartphone after they violated the device’s terms of service.
The buyers purchased their Pixel phones through Project Fi before shipping them to bargain hunting-site Dan’s Deals, where they were then resold for a small profit.
However, as Google’s terms of service strictly prohibit Pixel buyers from commercially reselling devices, the company took action against them – locking them out of all accounts, photos, emails and personal data stored with the company.
Dan’s Deals-owner Dan Eleff says he’s been operating similar transactions since the first generation of Nexus phone without any complaint from Google and was surprised at the company issuing a hard ban with zero warning.
“I’m not defending those who violated the terms of the sale, but I do think it is heavy-handed for Google to block access to all of their services for doing so,” he said.
Google has since issued a response to the incident, saying “We identified a scheme in which consumers were asked to purchase Pixel devices on behalf of a reseller, who then marked-up the cost of those devices in order to resell them to other customers.”
“We prohibit the commercial resale of devices purchased through Project Fi or the Google Store so everyone has an equal opportunity to purchase devices at a fair price. Many of the accounts suspended were created for the sole purpose of this scheme. After investigating the situation, we are restoring access to genuine accounts for customers who are locked out of many Google services they rely on.”