A group of Democratic Senators has requested YouTube remove videos containing election “misinformation.” They want YouTube to implement the strict censorship measures we have seen from Twitter.
In a letter addressed to YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, Senators Gary Peters of Michigan, Robert Mendez of New Jersey, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, expressed “deep concern” over the election misinformation spreading on the video-sharing platform.
“These videos seek to undermine our democracy and cast doubt on the legitimacy of President-elect Biden’s incoming administration. Moreover, because the current president has not committed to a peaceful transition of power, misinformation and manipulated media content on your platform may fuel civil unrest,” the senators wrote in the letter.
“Our teams are working around the clock to quickly remove content that violates our policies and ensure that we are connecting people with authoritative information about elections,” said a YouTube spokesperson in a response to the letter. “Like other companies, we allow discussions of this election’s results and the process of counting votes, and are continuing to closely monitor new developments.”
However, via a tweet, the company confirmed that almost 90 percent of the results on election searches are from mainstream media companies such as Fox and CNN. So the company is already low-key censoring the hundreds of hours of content by independent outlets, citizen journalists, and commentary channels.
Additionally, like its counterparts Facebook and Twitter, YouTube has been adding information labels to videos about the election. However, the platform is not as bold in its election censorship efforts as Twitter and Democrats want more censorship during the Georgia runoffs.
In the letter, the senators also requested YouTube to disclose how much money it was making from the content containing “misleading” information about the election.
