False reports about vaccines: YouTube blocks vaccine opponents

YouTube has long been under pressure to take action against fake news from vaccine opponents. Now the video platform is introducing new rules that forbid spreading false information about vaccines. Relevant channels have already been deleted.

The video platform YouTube is tightening its approach to countering false information from vaccine opponents. The Google subsidiary announced that from now on videos will be deleted in which approved vaccines are falsely portrayed as dangerous. YouTube does not limit itself to vaccines against the coronavirus, but applies the rule to vaccines in general. The platform also clears the channels of several well-known vaccine opponents.

This concerns, among other things, the prominent vaccine opponent Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The nephew of the US President John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1963, and the son of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, who was assassinated five years later, had a speech at a “lateral thinking” last year. Demonstration held in Berlin.

130,000 videos deleted

The YouTube channels of the Florida-based osteopath Joseph Mercola, whom the New York Times described as the “most influential spreaders of coronavirus misinformation on the Internet,” and the well-known osteopath and vaccine opponent Sherri Tenpenny from the state of Ohio were also blocked. According to its own information, YouTube has deleted 130,000 videos that violated the platform’s rules on corona vaccines since last year.

“We have steadily seen false claims about coronavirus vaccines expand into misinformation about vaccines in general,” said YouTube. “We are now at a point where it is more important than ever to expand the work we started with Covid-19 to other vaccines.” The new rules apply to vaccines that have been approved by local health authorities or the World Health Organization (WHO) and found to be “safe and effective”. This includes vaccinations against measles and hepatitis B.

RT Germany also affected

For example, videos that falsely claim that approved vaccines could lead to autism, cancer or infertility should be deleted, YouTube said. The rule also applies to claims “that substances in vaccines enable those who receive them to be located”.

Online platforms are under pressure to take action against the spread of false information – with a view to the corona pandemic, among other things. YouTube blocked the German-language YouTube channels of the Russian broadcaster RT this week for violating its guidelines when reporting on the pandemic. As a result, Russia threatened to block YouTube and similar measures against the German media.