Google CEO defends YouTube amid controversies over hate speech: "It's a difficult social problem"



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Google CEO Sundar Pichai defended his company's efforts to rid YouTube of hate speech and misinformation, as growing controversy continues to threaten the popular video-sharing platform.

In an interview with "Axios on HBO," Pichai said the company still had some work to do and told the media that YouTube had removed millions of videos in the last quarter that violated its rules.

"It's a difficult computer problem," Pichai told Axios. "It's also a difficult societal problem because we need better structures for hate speech, what is not, and how, as a business, we make these decisions on a large scale and make the right decisions without making mistakes. "

The tech giant also said YouTube wanted to bring some aspects of its approach to Google Search, which ranks sites according to their authority and expertise, to stave off misinformation and hate speech on the platform. video.

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"We're not quite where we want to be – I think it's really a difficult problem: how do you – YouTube has the size of any Internet – and I think we're making a lot of progress," said Pichai. "What we're trying to do is to gather more authoritative sources and check the facts in the videos, which might be controversial." That's what we're trying to do and we're working hard to improve."

The video platform, which has 1.8 billion daily users, has been working in different ways over the last few years to clean up the hateful content site and videos about conspiracy theory, while it's not the only one in the world. a growing chorus of critics and lawmakers has criticized the tech giant. to allow the site to become fertile ground for white supremacy and other forms of discrimination.

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Last week, YouTube announced a crackdown on white supremacist content and conspiracy theories through several policy changes. The company now specifically prohibits any video "alleging that a group is superior to the group in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion based on qualities such as age, sex, race, caste , religion, sexual orientation or the status of a veteran ".

This would include, for example, videos promoting or glorifying Nazi ideology; The company's policy on hate speech is explained here.

This hate speech policy update came amidst the controversy over journalist Carlos Vox Vox, who announced on May 30 detailed two years of homophobia and the racist harassment to which he claims to have been submitted by followers of Steven Crowder, a popular YouTube personality on the right.

In a series of videos, Crowder refers to Maza as "angry little queer", "gay mexican" and "Vox's Mr. Lispy queer". He also consulted sites selling t-shirts with slogans such as "Socialism is for the crazy".

Crowder, which has 3.9 million subscribers on the video platform, rejected the idea that it was harassing Maza and continued to publish videos about the controversy. It has also won at least 200,000 subscribers since YouTube announced the crackdown on hate speech.

Critics said YouTube had ruined the whole incident.

First, the technology company said Crowder's videos were not breaking its rules. Then, in a reversal, YouTube demonetized Crowder's videos, but left them on the site, which did not seem to satisfy people on both sides. Observers from the technology industry said the policy change, combined with a hashtag campaign of Crowder supporters, could have added to the harassment that Maza would have faced.

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Maza said YouTube did not care about its LGBTQ creators but just used the rainbow flag in its logo for Pride Month as a window decor. His employer, Vox, asked YouTube to do more to protect LGBTQ users and creators from harassment on its platform, including:

"We are strong advocates for a lively political debate and freedom of expression, and we believe that turning a blind eye to abuse does not make a difference. … The dangerous reaction against the creators who dare to speak out against abuse is all the more explosive as your rules are respected, are confusing and applied inconsistently and without transparency.This month of pride, change more than your logo.Clear and apply your harassment policy. "

Fox News has contacted Google for feedback and they have referred to their blog post on the incident.

Mountain View, California, faces threats on a number of fronts this year.

The Ministry of Justice examines potential infringements of competition law by the research giant. Several candidates for the Democratic nomination of 2020 have called for the resignation of Google and lawmakers are preparing to investigate the impact of Google and other technology companies on the decimation of local newspapers in the United States. United.

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