YouTube Gives Government Agents "Super Flagging" Ability to Remove Videos and Channels.

[Azt]

I think now is getting clear what google is after (after that "mistakenly suspension of the Russia Today channel for a couple of hours") ...

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=bBrxJEeeyI0

[ThePythonicCow]

Here's the Wall Street Journal article shown in the above Youtube video: YouTube Enlists ‘Trusted Flaggers’ to Police Videos (March 17, 2014):

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Google has given roughly 200 people and organizations, including a British police unit, the ability to “flag” up to 20 YouTube videos at once to be reviewed for violating the site’s guidelines.

The Financial Times last week reported that the U.K. Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit has been using its “super flagger” authority to seek reviews – and removal – of videos it considers extremist.

The news sparked concern that Google lets the U.K. government censor videos that it doesn’t like, and prompted Google to disclose more details about the program. Any user can ask for a video to reviewed. Participants in the super flagger program, begun as a pilot in 2012, can seek reviews of 20 videos at once.

A person familiar with the program said the vast majority of the 200 participants in the super flagger program are individuals who spend a lot of time flagging videos that may violate YouTube’s community guidelines. Fewer than 10 participants are government agencies or non-governmental organizations such as anti-hate and child-safety groups, the person added.

In either case, Google said it decides which videos are removed from YouTube. “Any suggestion that a government or any other group can use these flagging tools to remove YouTube content themselves is wrong,” a Google spokesman said.

Google’s guidelines prohibit videos that incite people to commit violence, or that show animal abuse, drug abuse, under-age drinking or bomb making, among other topics. Google maintains a separate system to monitor for copyright infringement.

The news about the super flagger program comes as some governments pressure social-media sites that they blame for civil unrest. In Turkey, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan threatened this month to ban Facebook and YouTube because they “encourage every kind of immorality and espionage for their own ends.”

British officials say they use the program to refer videos to YouTube that they believe have violated the U.K.’s Terrorism Act. These are then prioritized by YouTube, according to Sarah Buxton, a spokeswoman at the U.K. Home Office.

“YouTube may choose to remove legal extremist content if it breaches their terms and conditions,” she added.

Google was not pressured to let the U.K.’s counter-terrorism unit into the program, the person familiar with the program explained. Instead, the government agency showed an interest in YouTube’s guidelines and spotted videos that violated the rules, the person added.

More than 90% of the videos identified by super flaggers are either removed for violating guidelines, or restricted as not appropriate for younger users, the person familiar with the program said. That’s a far higher percentage than regular users who occasionally flag dubious content, the person said.

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[ThePythonicCow]

Here's a similar article from TheDrum: Google grants ‘super flagger’ status to British security services (March 13, 2014):

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Google has granted British security officials a so-called ‘super flagger’ status enabling them to have content deemed to be a national security threat to be instantly screened.

The move comes in the wake of a proliferation of jihadist videos mushrooming on the platform in the wake of the civil war in Syria, which have enticed up to 400 British Muslims to take part in the conflict.

Now YouTube has given the Home Office the power to flag up large volumes of similar content instead of individual videos in an effort to stem radicalisation.

Speaking to the Financial Times immigration minister James Brokenshire said the government had to do more to deal with content “that may not be illegal but certainly is unsavoury and may not be the sort of material that people would want to see or receive.”

Civil liberties campaigners have voiced alarm at the concession but Google insists it retains the final say on whether to remove content.

In a statement YouTube said: “We have a zero-tolerance policy on YouTube towards content that incites violence,” YouTube said. “Our community guidelines prohibit such content and our review teams respond to flagged videos around the clock, routinely removing videos that contain hate speech or incitement to commit violent acts.

“To increase the efficiency of this process, we have developed an invite-only program that gives users who flag videos regularly tools to flag content at scale.”

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(I added the bold highlight.)

[Sidney]

Freedom of expression, gone, and for some time now. We live in a dishonest world, under a dishonest system. There is no such thing as a free country.

[mojo]

Grrrrrrr, wish I never started a YouTube channel and kept my videos private...How can 200 people helping to fix copyrights overlook the obvious copyright infringements on YouTube?

[Dawn]

I have been 'looking' at the 'Pledge of Allegiance' which I felt compelled to participate in beginning at age 5 in Elementary school. I have decided to revoke, rescind, renounce, renounce, and utterly destroy all of the 'Pledges' I participated in.

It has come to my attention that by participating in a 'Pledge' to a nation of any sort, a person actually donates a part of their energy to maintaining that thing.

In the case of the United States... all citizens begin pledging themselves, in school, at a very young age. What do the US citizens pledge to? That is a good question and one that I still have open because the language is mysterious and somewhat mystical.... basically it is difficult to decipher exactly what US citizens are swearing fealty to. In fact, I think I'll open a thread about this. Personally, I'd really like to be sure that I am not contributing any of my own life force to the horror the US Government has become.

[RunningDeer]

Youtube Goes Full 1984, Promises to Hide "Offensive" Content Without Recourse - We Must Oppose This

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=8dQwd2SvFok

Published on Aug 1, 2017

YouTube to Censor "Controversial" Videos and Why You Should Care

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=U4hLFmrJLCo