YouTube has released a new blog titled, “Supporting the 2020 U.S. election.” The blog aims to clarify YouTube’s position in the presidential election of 2020 by elaborating over its policies. The blog was primarily written as a response towards reports of accusation. Users noticed that YouTube deletes content pertaining to election results. YouTube is an essential component of social media, several users resort to the platform in order to learn. The platform pretty much has information regarding any topic. Several users engage with the platform for learning, entertainment and information regarding anything and everything. In the blog, officials from YouTube maintain that YouTube is playing its role in combating election fraud.
YouTube deletes content regarding election results
YouTube said that their main goal in relation to the presidential election was that people engage with content that is authoritative. This was the goal to limit the spread of misinformation that could potentially lead to election fraud. In this day and age, information on social media plays a vital role when it comes to influencing people.
Moreover, the community guidelines specified by YouTube prohibit scam and coordinated influencing operations. The Twitter thread by YouTube regarding the matter says, “Our goal this election was to connect people to authoritative info, limit harmful misinfo & remove violative content. Subsequently, authoritative news was widely watched & recommended, and since Sept, we removed 8K+ channels for violating our policies.”
YouTube further stated that 77% of such videos were removed before they gathered 100 views. This demonstrates the efficiency of YouTube in tackling the issue of misinformation. The platform also prohibits any content that is aired to promote baseless conspiracy theories. Therefore, YouTube also removed content that alleged election fraud and claimed fraud or errors in the counting process.
Content regarding election fraud was deliberately removed
The Twitter thread says, “Yesterday was the safe harbor deadline. Now that enough states certified their Presidential election results, we’ll remove any content published today (or anytime after) that alleges widespread fraud or errors changed the 2020 U.S. Presidential election outcome.” YouTube states that it will remove any content that aims to deliberately plant misconceptions in the minds of people.
Social media users have praised this step by YouTube. This is because YouTube is used by people of all ages and nationalities. Naturally, false news tends to attract users and traffic from around the globe. If misinformation alleging errors in the election process is allowed to say, many people might get confused. Misinformation fuels conflict and chaos.
It is not up to the social media users to determine validity election results. Law and order authorities hold the responsibility to establish the truth and they are perfectly good at their jobs. YouTube concluded the thread by stating, “There’s always more to do. Striking the balance between openness & responsibility is one of our toughest challenges. We’re continuing to make improvements & will apply our learnings from this election, globally.”
