The more Google insists on forcing advertising on us, the more we should look closely at the wildly inappropriate and downright scammy ads they are hosting. If they can't leave well enough alone and look the other way on ad blocking, (which is the only way to avoid exposing myself and family to these dangerous ads), they need to be under a lot more scrutiny for the ads they choose to run.
If they want to sell a service in exchange for payment, then they are free to do so. For legal reasons they are not doing that. The explicit legal definition used by lawyers and politicians is that advertisement supported services are not a payment, but an optional content that the viewer might or might not look at. This optional aspect of advertisement is how laws distinguish between it and a sale. From a legal perspective there is a difference between selling a sample product for 1 cent, compared to giving it away for free. One is a sale, and the other is a free giveaway, and thus they are under different legal definitions.
There are similar legal theory for when a platform should be held legal responsible their products, for their advertisement, and when local laws applies and how. News papers, radio, and TV has each been forced to handle local advertisement laws and regulation, and there is a reason why most had departments to curate which advertisement they could publish. They also get held responsible if they break local law.