Google Accused of Profiting from Climate Misinformation on YouTube
Google has been found to be running advertisements on videos promoting climate crisis misinformation on YouTube, according to a report published by the Climate Action Against Disinformation (CAAD) coalition. The study highlights 100 videos featuring “blatant lies” about the climate crisis that Google ran advertisements on.
Despite updating its policies in October 2021 to prevent ads and monetization of content that opposes the scientific consensus on the climate crisis, the report found that Google has failed to effectively enforce these policies. The study revealed that Google ran ads on videos that violated the policy, including those that deny the existence of climate change. The report analyzed 200 YouTube videos that garnered a total of 73.8 million views as of April 17, 2023, with advertisements from well-known brands such as Hyundai, Costco, Tommy Hilfiger, and Nike.
“It really begs the question about what Google’s current level of enforcement is,” Callum Hood, the head of research at the Center for Countering Digital Hate, said in an interview with the New York Times.
Google claims to have reviewed the videos and removed ads from those violating its policy against climate change denial. However, the report urges a broader definition of disinformation that includes content promoting ineffective solutions for global warming, as this can hinder genuine climate action. The authors suggest that Google must strengthen its policies and take more assertive action to prevent the spread of climate misinformation on its platform.
According to researchers, gauging the complete scope of misinformation on YouTube is challenging as the process of watching videos is a time-consuming task, and their data access is restricted, forcing them to depend on manually scouring the platform using keywords.
Michael Aciman, a YouTube spokesman, said in a statement that the company allowed “policy debate or discussions of climate-related initiatives, but when content crosses the line to climate change denial, we remove ads from serving on those videos.” Aciman said that while “we enforce this policy rigorously, our enforcement is not always perfect, and we are constantly working to improve our systems to better detect and remove policy violating content. That’s why we welcome feedback from third parties when they think we’ve missed something.”
Alan Herrera is the Editorial Supervisor for the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents (AFPC-USA), where he oversees the organization’s media platform, foreignpress.org. He previously served as AFPC-USA’s General Secretary from 2019 to 2021 and as its Treasurer until early 2022.
Alan is an editor and reporter who has worked on interviews with such individuals as former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci; Maria Fernanda Espinosa, the former President of the United Nations General Assembly; and Mariangela Zappia, the former Permanent Representative to Italy for the U.N. and current Italian Ambassador to the United States.
Alan has spent his career managing teams as well as commissioning, writing, and editing pieces on subjects like sustainable trade, financial markets, climate change, artificial intelligence, threats to the global information environment, and domestic and international politics. Alan began his career writing film criticism for fun and later worked as the Editor on the content team for Star Trek actor and activist George Takei, where he oversaw the writing team and championed progressive policy initatives, with a particular focus on LGBTQ+ rights advocacy.