Question about Google Maps and News Publications and Reviews

In USA. I just want to preface this by saying I don't own a business. I'm just wondering what are the legal reasons Google is allowed to put a business on their maps app with reviews if I as a business owner don't want them to. Does it have something to do with freedom of speech? Like, I live in a large city that has a very prominent newspaper that does restaurant reviews. A bad review from them can ruin a business. They make money because people pay to read their reviews. Does this have something to do with freedom of the press? Is it kinda the same thing as a reporter asking a random person what they think about a business and then publishing what they recorded?

Is there any legal way to stop Google or a newspaper or any publication or website from posting reviews from anonymous people?

Are Google reviews protected under freedom of the press? Google themselves aren't the ones making the claims in their maps app reviews so I don't think that would fall under freedom of speech. They are just recording and distributing what someone else said so to me that sounds like what a newspaper would do.

I was about to go to a restaurant and I was looking up their reviews and I saw a few that were bad and the business responded by saying that whatever bad happened never happened.

Can a business sue a reviewer or even Google for defamation or libel if an inaccurate or false review affects their business? If so would Google have to give the reviewer's info out since many accounts that use Google to make reviews don't have the person making the reviews real name? A lot of the time it's just their username.

Just wondering

Posted Jun 3, 2026, 11:39 PM UTC

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