If you visit the license section of a Google font[0], you will find text such as:

These fonts are licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0.

You can use them freely in your products & projects - print or digital, commercial or otherwise.

This isn't legal advice, please consider consulting a lawyer and see the full license for all details.

With, in this case, a link to the Apache License v2.[1]

However this text is purely informational. The licence file included with downloaded fonts is simply a copy of the text at [1], which includes instructions on how to correctly apply the license, including the boilerplate "Copyright [yyyy] [name of copyright owner]".

Fonts under other licenses are similarly affected. What gives?

[0] https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Roboto#license [1] https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0