It's actually a quite common practice. Google has an entire in house PR team literally at the ready to field media questions and respond. The fact they did not

It's actually a quite common practice. Google has an entire in house PR team literally at the ready to field media questions and respond. The fact they did not respond, or gave the infamous "no comment" does say _something_ though admittedly not much. But that's why it's a disclaimer. Often "immediately" means something different than the literal definition too. I.e. it's a super safe way to say "they may have actually responded sometime since we asked, but not in time to be included here." It's not _great_ journalism but it is transparent.