624 YouTube Has Started Redirecting Searches for Violent Extremism to Anti-Terrorism Videos

Bucharest, Romania – March 28, 2012: Youtube logo is displayed on a mobile phone screen. YouTube is a video-sharing website, on which users can upload, view and share videos.

YouTube has started to redirect searches for violent extremism content sometimes used to recruit ISIS members to anti-terrorism videos.

The technique, implemented with Google as part of a four-step initiative to combat online terror, hopes to “provide more resources and more content that can help change minds of people at risk of being radicalized,” the company announced in a blog post Thursday.

The “Redirect Method” essentially works like this: Whenever people search for specific keywords on YouTube, a targeting tool flags the search and instead prompts a playlist of videos “debunking violent extremist recruiting narratives.”

The tool was developed by Google’s technology incubator Jigsaw in partnership with anti-extremist data firm Moonshot CVE over the past several years.

I – Word Understanding
Flag – to mark an item for attention or treatment
Debunk – to show that something is false, wrong or unimportant

II – Have Your Say
1. Are you a youtube user? What videos do you find useful / not useful?
2. Do you think youtube or videos in general are effective tools to promote extremism? How about other social networking sites?
3. Aside from extremism, fake news are also flooding the internet. Facebook promises measures to combat this. What are your other concerns on internet contents?

624 YouTube Has Started Redirecting Searches for Violent Extremism to Anti-Terrorism Videos