YouTube India adopts two-pronged strategy to fight fake news ahead of general elections

Google-owned video streaming giant YouTube will tackle the menace of fake news and disinformation in the run-up to the general elections in India by taking them down and by giving users access to high-quality news content by partnering with credible news publishers and independent journalists, a top company official said.

“Our misinformation policies clearly state that if the content has been technically manipulated with the intent to deceive a user and there's a danger of real-world harm, we will act against that content. I want to reiterate that that's only one part of the strategy,” YouTube India Director Ishan Chatterjee said during an interaction on Thursday.

Chatterjee further added that the other part of the strategy to fight fake news is to ensure that people have access to high-quality content that news organisations and independent journalists are producing.


While news is not a separate vertical on YouTube, it continues to be a key driver of content consumption on the platform.

“We are seeing a lot of news consumption on both YouTube Shorts as well as CTV (Connected TV). These two platforms are seeing a lot of growth, and that's flowing into news consumption as well,” he added.

Chatterjee said CTV has been the fastest-growing platform for YouTube for the last 5 years, with over 58 million people streaming YouTube on their TV in India as of June.

YouTube Director and Global Head of Responsibility Tim Katz said that the Indian market is unique since the consumption of live content, including news, is very high, including on CTV.

“The other two things that have been exciting to see are that we've seen a lot of growth, particularly during sensitive moments, with large news stories occurring certainly during an election cycle, and we just see very large growth from many of our authoritative partners,” he noted.

Katz pointed out that there has been a growth in the different types of news partners that are coming onto the platform, including independent journalists, broadcasters, print publishers, and digital native publishers.

“We've seen growth across all of those different segments, and we want to make sure that we're serving all those segments, so it's been great to see the diversity of the news ecosystem growing on the platform,” he noted.

A report by the Google News Initiative in collaboration with Kantar found that video is the most popular format for consuming news across languages and formats.

The report also found that 1 in 2 Indian language internet users are consumers of news in India, with a third of these coming from urban areas. Across India, 7 in 10 users are consuming hyperlocal news.

As per the Oxford Economics Impact Report, 70% of media and music companies in India with a YouTube channel agree that YouTube is an important source of revenue for their company.