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A YouTube channel that had been implicated in Russia disinformation operations to target the U.S. 2016 election has been taken down by Google.<\/p>\n
Earlier this week The Daily Beast<\/a> claimed the channel, run by two black video bloggers calling themselves Williams and Kalvin Johnson, was part of Russian disinformation operations \u2014 saying this had been confirmed to it by investigators examining how social media platforms had been utilized in a broad campaign by Russia to try to influence US politics.<\/p>\n The two vloggers apparently had multiple social media accounts on other platforms. And their content was pulled from Facebook back in August after being identified as Russian-backed propaganda, according to the Daily Beast\u2019s sources.<\/p>\n Videos posted to the YouTube channel, which was live until earlier this week, apparently focused on criticizing and abusing Hillary Clinton, including accusing her of being a racist as well as spreading various conspiracy theories about the Clintons, along with pro-Trump commentary.<\/p>\n The content appeared intended for an African American audience, although the videos did not gain significant traction on YouTube, according to The Daily Beast, which said they had only garnered \u201chundreds\u201d of views prior to the channel being closed (vs the pair\u2019s Facebook page having ~48,000 fans before it was closed, and videos uploaded there racking up \u201cthousands\u201d of views).<\/p>\n A Google spokesman ignored the specific questions we put to it about the YouTube channel, sending only this generic statement: \u201cAll videos uploaded to YouTube must comply with our Community Guidelines and we routinely remove videos flagged by our community that violate those policies. We also terminate the accounts of users who repeatedly violate our Guidelines or Terms of Service.\u201d<\/p>\n So while the company appears to be confirming it took the channel down it\u2019s not providing a specific reason beyond TOS violations at this stage. (And the offensive nature of the content offers more than enough justification for Google to shutter the channel.)<\/p>\n However,\u00a0earlier this week<\/a> the Washington Post reported that Google had uncovered evidence that Russian operatives spent money buying ads on its platform in an attempt to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election, citing people familiar with the investigation.<\/p>\n The New York Times<\/a>\u00a0also reported that Google has found accounts believed to be associated wth the Russian government \u2014 claiming Kremlin agents purchased $4,700 worth of search ads and more traditional display ads. It also said the company has found a\u00a0separate $53,000 worth of ads with political material that were purchased from Russian internet addresses, building addresses or with Russian currency \u2014 though the newspaper\u2019s source said it\u2019s not clear whether the latter spend was definitively associated with the Russian government.<\/p>\n Google has yet to publicly confirm any of these reports. Though it has not denied them either. Its\u00a0statement so far has been that: \u201cWe are taking a deeper look to investigate attempts to abuse our systems, working with researchers and other companies, and will provide assistance to ongoing inquiries.\u201d<\/p>\n The company has been called to testify<\/a>\u00a0to a Senate Intelligence Committee on November 1, along with\u00a0Facebook, and Twitter. The committee is examining how social media platforms may have been used by foreign actors to influence the 2016 US election.<\/p>\n