Tech

YouTube says it is banning supremacist videos

Key Points
  • YouTube says it will ban videos from supremacist groups.
  • The move comes as the Google-owned video site comes under more scrutiny for hateful content and misinformation.
Susan Wojcicki, chief executive officer of YouTube.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Google-owned YouTube said on Wednesday that it will begin removing videos that contain supremacist content.

In a blog post, the company said, "Today, we're taking another step in our hate speech policy by specifically prohibiting videos alleging that a group is superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion based on qualities like age, gender, race, caste, religion, sexual orientation or veteran status."

The move comes as YouTube continues to grapple with hateful content, misinformation and other abusive videos across the site. This week, The New York Times reported that YouTube's recommendation system showed videos of underage girls to users who watched erotic videos. Also this week, YouTube said it would not take down videos from a conservative YouTube channel that repeatedly criticized Vox journalist Carlos Maza's sexual orientation, even though the videos appeared to violate YouTube's content policies.

In the blog post, YouTube also said it was expanding its "borderline content" policy to more countries outside the U.S. YouTube considers borderline content to be videos that don't technically violate its policies, but could be used to spread fake news and information. YouTube said it limits the spread of those videos by reducing how often they're recommended to users.

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