A tutorial on securing a web server and a tutorial on getting into one can share their vocabulary and even their tools, and Google’s policies treat them very differently. Security, health and finance are the subjects where that difference matters most to a publisher, because the policy lines run through the topic instead of around it.
What the policies target
Three Google policy pages cover the parts that matter most here, and none is a list of banned subjects. They describe what content does, not what it mentions.
The first is the policy on enabling dishonest behavior. It does not allow content that helps users deceive others: fake documents such as passports and diplomas, and the sale of academic work, writing services or exam-taking services. It does not allow content that promotes any form of hacking or cracking, or that provides instructions, equipment or software that alter or give unauthorized access to devices, software, servers or websites. And it does not allow content that enables tracking or monitoring a person without their authorization: spyware, spousal monitoring, GPS trackers designed to spy. It excludes private investigator services and parental control products for minors.
The second is the policy on misrepresentative content and deceptive practices. It covers content that misrepresents, distorts or conceals information about the publisher, the creator, the purpose or the content itself, and content that falsely implies an affiliation or an endorsement. In the wider list of content policies, scams and phishing sit under deceptive practices, and false claims about elections, health and climate sit under misleading content.
The third concerns unreliable and harmful claims. Google does not allow content that promotes harmful health claims, or that contradicts the authoritative scientific consensus during a major ongoing health crisis.
None of these three is specific to finance, as far as we can read them. In our reading, finance pages meet the rules through the second one, when they promise gains they cannot support or hide who is paid. Google may apply further rules to specific products or regions that we do not cover here, so read the full list in the policy center for your own case.
Context and intent matter more than keywords. A defensive security tutorial, such as hardening a server, auditing your own network or explaining an attack so a reader can block it, is not targeted in itself. Instructions to get into systems you do not own are. We cannot tell you where Google draws the line for a specific page: it publishes no verdict for individual pages, and a refusal does not detail its reason. What follows is our reading of the policy text as of 7 October 2026 and our own editorial practice, not a guarantee.
Eight rewrites, from risky framing to safer
Each row pairs a framing that tends to collide with the policy text with a way of writing about the same subject that serves a reader without enabling harm.
| Subject | What causes trouble | How to write it instead |
|---|---|---|
| Break-in tutorial | Step-by-step instructions to get into a server, site or account you do not own, or around its login | Teach the weakness and its fix: how the flaw works, how to spot it in your logs, how to close it on your own server. Say which systems the reader may test: their own, or ones where they hold written permission |
| Cracking tool | A page that distributes or promotes software whose purpose is defeating protection, such as license crackers or tools for breaking other people’s passwords | Explain how to audit your own network or recover access to your own account, link to the vendor’s documentation, and describe tools by what they check rather than what they bypass |
| Spying on a person | How to read someone’s messages or follow their phone without their knowledge | How to check your own phone for unwanted monitoring. For children, cover parental control products designed for minors, which the policy leaves out |
| Fake papers and academic services | Selling diplomas, passports or other documents, or essays and exam-taking for pay | How to verify that a document or a diploma is genuine, and how to study, cite and write your own work |
| Phishing | How to build a fake login page that collects passwords | How to recognize and report phishing, how to check a sender, what to do after typing a password into a fake page |
| Miracle cures | Promising that a product cures a condition, urging readers to stop treatment, or contradicting authoritative consensus in a health crisis | State what is established and name the source, separate evidence from anecdote, say who reviewed the page and when, send decisions about care to a clinician, and promise no outcome |
| Promised profits | ”Guaranteed” or “risk-free” returns, undisclosed fees, a recruitment pitch dressed as advice | Explain how the product works, what it costs, what can go wrong and how you are paid. Give risk the same prominence as upside |
| Look-alike of an official service | A page styled to look like a government, bank or support site, or one that implies a partnership or endorsement it does not have | State plainly who you are and that you are independent, link to the official source and claim no affiliation you do not hold |
The right-hand column changes what the page asks the reader to do. It is not a disguise, and wording alone does nothing. Calling a break-in tutorial “educational” does not change what it enables, and a disclaimer states your intent without changing what the instructions let a reader do.
The reverse also holds: defensive writing that uses attack vocabulary is not a problem in itself. Our own study of what hits a small site every week, our server logs, names the paths that scanners probe, because a defender needs to know them, and pairs each group with a way to close the door.
Show who is behind the page
For subjects where a wrong answer can hurt someone, Google’s guidance on helpful content is a good test. It frames content around 3 questions. Who created it: clear authorship and author information, without false qualifications and without author profiles generated by AI. How it was made: transparency about the way the page was produced, including any use of AI. And why it exists: for readers first. Google adds that E-E-A-T is not a specific ranking factor, and that trust is the central element of it.
In practice that means a named author with a real background, claims tied to primary sources such as a regulator, a medical body or the vendor’s documentation, a visible date and last update, and a scope statement on risky material (“test only on systems you own”). It also means saying how you earn from the page when you recommend a product. Our guide on E-E-A-T for small publishers shows how we apply the same ideas to this site.
A tool can help with one narrow part of this. The AdSense checker scans the pages it samples for a short list of phrases in 6 categories: adult content, gambling, piracy, dangerous goods, drugs and malicious hacking. It reads words, not context. It can flag a defensive article that quotes the name of an attack, and it cannot see a harmful page that avoids those phrases. A hit means “reread this page against the policy”, and a clean result proves nothing about intent.
What we cannot tell you
We cannot tell you whether a particular page of yours crosses a line. Google publishes the policy text and the categories, it does not publish a ruling for each page, and the reason it gives after a refusal is short. The rejection reasons guide covers what a refusal does and does not say. If you hold an account, the policy center in it is where Google lists the violations it finds.
If a page on your site sits near one of the rows above and you are unsure, you have 3 honest options: rewrite it toward defense or evidence, narrow its scope, or decide that it does not belong on a monetized site. Google’s policy pages change over time, so reread the ones cited at the foot of this guide before a big decision, and compare with the AdSense requirements checklist for everything that sits outside these 3 policies.
