YouTube cracks down on child-exploiting channels

Cracking down on abuse and child-exploiting channels and videos, YouTube on Wednesday announced it will remove content on the platform that attempts to pass as being "friendly for kids". "While some of these videos may be suitable for adults, others are completely unacceptable, so we are working to remove them from YouTube," Johanna Wright, Vice President of Product Management, YouTube, wrote in a blog post. The Google-owned company will apply machine learning technology and automated tools in order to discover potentially exploitive content.

YouTube has terminated 50 channels and removed thousands of videos as also advertisements from 5,00,000 exploitive videos under the current set of guidelines. The company will also continue to work with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to report potentially illegal behaviour to law enforcement, said Wright. Meanwhile, YouTube Kids announced new measures last week for parents if they find children watching inappropriate videos at home even by mistake.

If the user is signed in while reporting a video, it will also be blocked from the YouTube Kids app, the company said in a statement. "When you block a video or channel, you will no longer see that video on the YouTube Kids apps when you are signed in. You can always clear your blocked videos and channels from Settings if you change your mind," the company had said.