YouTube has stopped conservative news outlet One America News Network from posting new videos for a week and making money from existing videos after it touted a bogus treatment for Covid-19.
The video has been removed under YouTube’s policies to prevent the spread of misinformation for Covid-19, which prohibits the statement that there is a guaranteed cure for the virus. YouTube spokeswoman Ivy Choi said OANN has been suspended due to “repeated violations” of this policy.
“Since the start of this epidemic, we have worked to prevent the spread of harmful misinformation related to Covid-19 on YouTube,” Choi said.
YouTube’s Covid misinformation policies prohibit content that questions the existence of the virus, discourages a person from seeking medical treatment for Covid, opposes guidance from local health authorities on the pandemic, or provides unfounded medical advice or treatment.
Under these policies, the violating account will receive one warning for spreading false information and then three violations before it is permanently removed from the platform. Violations are gradually imposed tougher penalties, including withdrawal of income. OANN previously received a warning “due to a similar violation of the Covid-19 disinformation policy,” according to YouTube.
The company said it has manually reviewed and removed 200,000 videos related to dangerous or misleading information on Covid-19 since February 2020, including for example A widely condemned A viral video published by the right-wing media outlet Breitbart, showing questionable claims from people identifying themselves as doctors and asking them not to wear masks
While the suspension from posting new videos is temporary, YouTube says removing all OANN content will be permanent, unless the network addresses its problems.
Tuesday’s dismissal comes after four Democratic senators He sent a message Tuesday To YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, you are pressuring the company to do more to stamp out election misinformation.
Meanwhile, after breaking up with longtime ally Fox News, Donald Trump has urged his supporters to turn to media outlets like Newsmax and OANN. These outlets openly support Trump and cast doubt on the validity of Joe Biden’s election. YouTube said it does not consider OANN a “reliable news source”, which means that under its policies, the account will not appear high in search results for broad searches about Covid-19 and will not be promoted in recommendations.
