YouTube will vet videos ... but only 5% of them

‘Funnelling money to extremists’

YOUTUBE has finally agreed to tackle hate speech by having humans rather than computers vet its most popular videos.

The Google-owned video platform says the moderators will ‘manually review’ the top 5 per cent of its thousands of channels.

Only suitable videos will be allowed to make money from advertising placed alongside them. Those failing the test would be denied the ad revenue, restricted or even removed.

Any offensive videos amid the remaining 95 per cent of YouTube content will stay online unless reported by users, picked up by artificial intelligence, or spotted by a network of ‘trusted flaggers’.

The shake-up follows pressure from the Daily Mail and other newspapers to stop hate preachers and extremists from making money on YouTube.

Companies had also started a boycott after finding their advertisements next to vile videos. YouTube’s announcement stops far short of vetting every video on its website before allowing ‘uploaders’ to make money.

It will still be possible for farRight extremists and other ‘bad actors’ to cash in. However YouTube has taken another step to restrict unsuitable, niche videos.

In a blog post it said it would now allow adverts to appear on YouTube channels only if they had at least 1,000 followers and had had 4,000 hours of their content watched by others over the past year. The change has angered smaller YouTube ‘creators’ who will struggle to make money from the platform. However, it will also stop big brands from inadvertently funnelling money to extremists who often set up new channels to dodge detection.

Paul Muret of Google said the changes would ‘help us reward the creators who make engaging content while preventing bad actors and spammers from gaming the system in order to monetize unsuitable content’.

Previously Google used a computer algorithm to place adverts next to content – without knowing what that content was or how much traction it had. Those who post the videos receive a cut of the advertising revenues enjoyed by the technology giant.

Google has been using moderators to vet content – but they have examined videos only once they have been flagged up. It said it was unrealistic to have them wade through the 400 hours of content that are uploaded to the website every second. But last month it said it would expand its team of moderators to 10,000.

YouTube invites firms to place their adverts in the top 5 per cent of its channels under its ‘Preferred’ service. Mr Muret said it would take staff until March to watch every video in this category.

He insisted he wanted to ensure that Preferred ‘not only offers the most popular content on YouTube, but also the most vetted’.

The channels are included in the Preferred list based on their popularity. This is mainly based on the times they have been watched.