After backlash, Youtube says better policies against hate speech in the works

BENGALURU: Google-owned video service YouTube is updating its hate speech policy, as it faces backlash over inaction in addressing hateful and borderline harmful content on its platform.

Starting Wednesday, YouTube will specifically prohibit videos with supremacist content that portray a race, religion or a group as superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion. YouTube will also remove several videos and channels that violate the new policies. YouTube said it will remove these videos even if they do not explicitly call for violence.

The company declined to disclose specific information on how many channels or videos would be taken down as part of the policy changes.


It, however, said the changes were made in consultation with dozens of subject-matter experts in areas including violent extremism, supremacism, civil rights and free speech.

It said it had taken down 8.3 million videos that violated its community guidelines in the first quarter of this year. Interestingly, the development comes on a day when You-Tube declined to take action against a popular right-wing commentator in the United States who is accused of homophobic and racist harassment of a journalist.

In a series of tweets on Wednesday, YouTube said its teams conducted an in-depth review of the flagged videos and determined that while they found the language to be “clearly hurtful”, it didn’t violate their policies.