Under enormous pressure from advertisers boycotting it Google-owned YouTube unveiled on June 18 its new, improved plan to fight terrorism on line. Its General Counsel, Kent Walker, posted an op-ed in the European Financial Times pledging new technologies to fight extremism, deploy more flaggers, “redirect would be-ISIS followers to debunking videos, and to form a global forum to combat internet terrorism.
So how has YouTube performed since that June 18th pledge? What was billed as the new and improved Corvette is more like a new and improved Edsel.
Instead of complaining, I decided to put the facts speak for themselves and let you decide whether YouTube’s management is being square with the American people (caveat emptor…as soon as I upload this article, Google could very well take down the videos flagged, but as of 4:15pm on July 28, they are all there).
For a company, which prides itself on warp speed technology and change, let’s stress test what it has accomplished since those pledges to fulfill its promise to corporate and citizen America:
1. On June 18 there were approximately 64,000 autofil videos exclusively devoted to Anwar al-Awlaki – the American-born radical jihadi bombmaking terrorist responsible for inciting and radicalizing most native English speaking terrorists and wannabees. Today, there are 72,100 Anwar al-Awlaki – an increase of 8,000 dangerous videos which continue to train, incite and radicalize potential terrorists at home and abroad.
2. Known ISIS bomb making videos were appearing on its platform. The Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi viewed ISIS bomb-making videos on YouTube. On June 24, 2017, a YouTube spokesman stated in the New York Times that:
“We do not allow bomb-making videos and quickly removed flagged videos that break our rules…”
The bomb-making video viewed by the Manchester concert suicide bomber was still on YouTube on July 18, 2017.
3. On June 21, 2017, ISIS posted on YouTube a video with instructions how to construct a suicide vest. This video is still on YouTube as of July 28, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=od36GMG57kw
For good measure, another ISIS video on how to construct and detonate a terrorist bomb which we located in early July was still on YouTube today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLslOXJ3cu0
4. YouTube also pledged new resources to “redirect” people searching for “violent extremist propaganda and serve up videos that denounce terrorism. Operating through its “Jigsaw” subsidiary, YouTube is serving up playlists of videos “debunking ISIS mythology.” http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-40681625
As part of a more sustained, comprehensive effort, this “redirect” initiative could be helpful. How is it working so far, many months after it was publicly inaugurated by YouTube? We stress tested ISIS videos to determine whether we would be redirected. We uploaded 8 random ISIS extremist incitement videos during 9 hours between July 24-26, 2017 from ISIS major on-line communications forum ― Dabiq. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWa9HMYvV7o8JM5lL5WpaYQ
Not to my surprise, but to my utter disappointment, none/NADA of these randomly selected videos on YouTube redirect a soul to any playlist challenging the claims of the Islamic State, much less to a video of a kitten tangled in yarn.
5. In this deadly game of jihadi cat and mouse, we are finding that ISIS is integrating platforms to “bait” viewers onto what appear to be Islamic educational videos, and then – stealing a page from YouTube – REDIRECTING viewers to more sinister locations on Twitter and Facebook. Case in point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCTVoTukczY&feature=youtu.be&a. Here is the twitter account that YouTube is redirecting you to: https://twitter.com/tawhid76100531 Unless YouTube is prepared to use the best practices currently available to it (which is refuses to do for the explanations set forth in my June 22,2017 article) (Google’s New Anti-Extremist Policy is Thin Gruel Against Terrorism) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/594c489ae4b0c85b96c657f5, its management is blowing smoke at the American people.
6. Radical Imam’s continue to cash in big time on YouTube, as well. A British based SOB by the name of Tarik Chadlioui, is facing extradition to Spain. He is a known recruiter for ISIS. Despite being flagged to YouTube, Chadlioui has over 2,000 videos on YouTube, with over 16,000 subscribers with over 13 million views, and earned hundreds of British Pounds from advertising royalties paid by YouTube to him.
Shouldn’t we be judging the Google-YouTube book by its content and not by its cover-up?
YouTube’s management suffers, at the American people’s expense, from a systematic corporate narcissism which prevents it from believing anyone else not on its payroll is not worthy of entrance to the Emerald City even though the emperor has no clothes.
Case in point: both Hany Farid, Chairman of the Dartmouth College Computer Science Department (and the developer of anti-extremist content software known as “eGLYPH”) and Eric Feinberg, a Detroit-based computer scientist (and developer of GIPEC technology which tags extremist content virtually within seconds of being uploaded) have separately offered their respective software applications to YouTube.
Guess what YouTube’s management has said to each? Sorry, we’re not interested in what you have to offer us even if it could greatly expedite the removal of extremist content. Sheer Silicon Valley Chutzpah, and, oh by the way, the content I identified as violating all of YouTube’s pledges was obtained from the technologies immediately available and already deployed in Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa from Dr. Farid and Dr. Feinberg.
To be fair, it is an enormous challenge to flag extremist content and decipher what is verifiable ISIS incitement from mere claptrap, especially in foreign languages. No one expects miracles overnight, but YouTube’s management is just not being open and honest with us mere mortals and the irrefutable examples I flagged above are cases in point. Its management is engaged in a game of diverting us away from its irrefutable failures instead of redirecting viewers away from extremism.
The American people deserve best efforts from Google/YouTube, not best alibis. Our homeland security and people’s lives unfortunately depend on these ungoverned corporate utilities putting the safety and security of the nation first and what is right over self-dealing.
After 75 days of promises and assurances, Google-YouTube has come up short. If our small team could do in a matter of hours with existing software available to YouTube what we flagged above what YouTube couldn’t do in almost two months, something is very, very wrong!
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