Good news! You’re both wrong or at least not entirely right. That’s called greeking and is done on literally any brand, marketing or imagery of any kind unless specifically approved by that company, and or the artist that made the imagery regardless of whether that company has given them money or not. Its often done with a sticker and a graphic made of some made up brand or maybe just tape over it but this is my favorite type. This means the on set dresser took that from crafty because they weren’t expecting a fridge shot today and “greeked” out surge by using a sharpie to fill in the spaces. Just great work right there.
This is all out of fear that they might be sued. That’s all.
Like I said just not entirely correct.
You are right that they don’t want to seem like they’re advertising for a company, but I was building off the first comment stating it was companies they couldn’t extort money out of and I’m sure you know thats just not how product placement works.