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Google Reveals "Terrorism Video" Removals
jones_supa writes "Google has revealed it removed about 640 videos from YouTube that allegedly promoted terrorism over the second half of 2011 after complaints from the UK's Association of Chief Police Officers. The news was contained in its latest Transparency Report which discloses requests by international authorities to remove or hand over material. YouTube had also rejected many other state's requests for action. Overall, Google summed it had received 461 court orders covering a total of 6,989 items between July and December 2011. From those, it said 68% of the orders were complied with. Google added that it had received a further 546 informal requests covering 4,925 items, of which it had agreed to 43% of the cases."
Why is it that some people believe that if they hide away from something that something ceases to exist?
Once upon a time, the term 'terrorism' was used for attacks that inflict terror upon the population. Now, it seems to be used indiscriminately and anyone you don't agree with is a terrorist.
Better to take them down than receive a subpoena for the information of everyone who viewed them, whatever their reason for viewing them may be.
sudo make me a sandwich
The 32% they absolutely refused to take down were videos of cute little kittens.
Free speech concerns aside, I'm much more afraid of terrorists promoting their agenda in the dark than those who shout it from the rooftops. It's a lot easier to keep track of people stupid enough to put themselves out in the public sphere (and those who associate with them).
I bet if you could see the list, many of these "terrorists" would turn out to be people just criticizing their governments and revealing government secrets.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
Ban all infomercials from YouTube and classify videos promoting terrorism as infomercials.
I was lying in bed last night, reading a book that is set in 1998, and it suddenly occurred to me that I REALLY miss the pre-9/11 world. So absolutely sick of hearing about all this supposed terrorism.
There's no legal guarantee of free speech in this context. The (metaphorical) microphone belongs to Google, since they are hosting everything and letting people upload their stuff at no cost. As long as they can make money off of what people say into their microphone, they'll let them keep talking. And if Google decides they occasionally want to grab their microphone back and make somebody stop talking into it, that's their right. People are free to complain and criticize such treatment, but that doesn't affect Google's right to do what they want with their microphone (metaphor for website).
Ironically, it could arguably be a violation of freedom if Google didn't have the right to censor their own website.
...to not keep information on people who view them.
Palm trees and 8
the free marketers are usually propagandized fools in the service of the oligarchy. a handful of large corporations that collude with each other and infect the government does not represent any ideal of the free market, but they are the only ones who benefit from free market fundamentalist rhetoric and political action
meanwhile, the only institution actually intended to protect the little guy, the government, is vilified by the clueless little guys. they want to remove their only protection, their government, because their government is ineffective, and it is ineffective because it has been infected by the corruption by large corporations
through their thoughts and actions, free market fundamentalists expose themselves to even more pain and suffering at the hands of large corporations by desiring the dismantling of their government. the oligarchy of large corporations do not represent the free market, and genuine free markets are hurt as the government's regulations, the only thing that actually keeps free markets truly free, are dismantled. a truly regulation free market NATURALLY devolves into domination by its largest players. only a government and its regulations keeps a market truly free, that is, balanced in power between the little guy and the big guy
so i'm sorry, i do blame the free market fundamentalists for our problems. we suffer for their economic illiteracy in service of a mythology about how free markets function that never existed and never will
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
However sceptical I am re. censorship your posting is insightful to many but the fundamentalists.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
no. free speech is important, i support it
the problem is free speech fundamentalism, which is an entirely different enchilada
you are confusing two entirely different concepts
free speech fundamentalism is the idea that speech needs no limits, and ANY limits are therefore as bad and the same as THE WORST KIND of limits
we're talking about people, for example, who equate china squashing all political expression, with the west squashing kiddie porn. they obviously are not the same. but to a free speech fundamentalism, it's the same, it's just all censorship, regardless of the subject matter
nonsense
free speech has it's limits: i can't shout fire in a crowded theatre, i can't threaten to kill someone, i can't incite people to kill someone (these terrorist videos), i can't secretly record you having sex with your wife then put it on a billboard next to the highway: free speech has its limits in a free society. and SOME forms of speech are not free, and should not be allowed: those that cause real harm to individuals. you can say that, and you can still say you support free speech passionately. you just have to have to be wise enough to know that real life is more complicated than ham fisted oversimplifications
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
This article from Reuters says 1,000...
Google: government requests to censor content "alarming"
Also, this all stems from Google's own blog/press release: More transparency into government requests
ACPO is a very strange organisation, it's an unaccountable PLC, refusing FOI requests, and yet it is funded in part by tax payer's money and has a lot of power within the police and government.
"It’s not just the right of the person who speaks to be heard; it is the right of everyone in the audience to listen, and to hear. And every time you silence someone you make yourself a prisoner of your own action because you deny yourself the right to hear something." -- Christopher Hitchens
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
It seems particularly ironic that you are using a phrase condemning people who refused to stand up against genocide to condemn people who stand up against terrorism.
The term "terrorist" is defined by the eye of the beholder. Even though it means something like "a person whose goal is to increase fear among a certain population". They'll use it instead of the real word they are looking for: treasonous. Because treason could be a Good Thing and terrorism can't.
This is NOT a matter of Google self censorship.
It is government authorities coming to Google with "polite requests" and court orders about certain content that the authorities and government's don't like.
It's likely that they're making profit-based decisions, but those decisions are also being made under government coercion.
Look at what happened to WikiLeaks. They did something the government didn't like, and all of a sudden government strong-arms PayPal, Amazon and others to dissociate themselves. Even though WikiLeaks had committed no crime other than embarrassing the government.
Authorities shouldn't have such arbitrary powers.
Yes, idealism should be tempered by practicality. Tell me, as a practical matter, how is censorship better than counter propaganda?
Do you think that these people are just going to go away if you censor them? Do you think censorship won't help them paint themselves as persecuted, and serve as a marketing tool for them?
If you think Islamist propaganda is an effective recruitment tool, wouldn't anti-islamist propganda be just as effective? How are you going to counter their arguments if their indoctrination isn't taking place in public?
You can call me a fundamentalist if you like, but you haven't shown any reason to think that censorship is going to be effective. It certainly sets a nice precedent for suppressing dissenting opinions on Youtube though.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Since terrorist has become commonly used to refer to anyone that the government does not like for any reason what so ever, you have to wonder how many of these video actually had anything to do with terrorism.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I take for granted that Google is in bed with the three letter agencies and has been for a long time. I consider it reasonable to assume that government agencies have multiple hooks into the internet both at backbone locations (unencrypted traffic) as well as nodes inside key services like Gmail and Skype so they don't miss out on any of that juicy stuff either.
That irritates me because it probably should be considered unconstitutional, but it would probably take a huge whistleblowing movement to set right, and somebody would probably go to jail (or worse) along the way. ...and the powers that be would immediately set something else up, like Whack-a-Mole.
Everything has its limits. The problem arises when someone attempts to define those limits. A major problem arises when people attempt to define those limits and then impose them on others who might not see it the same way. What if the Catholic church was put in charge of defining the limits? Suppose all governments defined limits that mimicked those imposed by the Chinese government?
I stick to my absolutist position on free speech because we should always err on the side of favoring unrestricted communication over government-imposed "limits". We "fundamentalists" are a necessary counter-balance to the authoritarian nuts who want to use government power to enforce their subjectively defined limits.
I disagree! Some posts even encouraged the protection of kiddie porn as free speech. what the grandparent was talking about is pragmatism; and I agree with him.
Currently, I see many US citizens carrying the corporate flags against the oppression and tyranny of the government...how ironic, when you look at how little the corporations care for people and their needs!
Delta-Mike November Bravo Tango
The statists are propagandized into believing that big government is the solution to the majority of societal problems. They support this massive and inherently corrupt(infected as you say) government in the futile hope that SOME DAY the little people will be able to take over this massive power and use it for the general good. It will never happen, and if it does, it will be a transient situation.
What the statists fail to understand is that concentrated power is an inherently corrupting influence, and that some systems are far too large and chaotic to be managed and controlled. The problem isn't with the current people in charge, as the statists like to suggest ("we just need to elect the right people"), the problem is with human nature and the institution of government itself. A big government built on a central planning model naturally becomes corrupted.
Why blame the corporations (whom we all know exist for the single purpose of maximizing profits) for corrupting the government? Why not blame the government (whom we all know is SUPPOSED TO exist to serve the governed) for betraying the people?
Government bailouts, subsidies, no-bid contracts, selectively enforced regulations and laws granting "special privileges" to the elite few are what maintains and exacerbates the disparities between the big guys and little guys. It is no coincidence that the concentration of wealth in the private sector has grown in lockstep with the concentration of power in the public sector.
That free market "mythology" coupled with a small and decentralized government(not zero government) is what turned the U.S. into the world's economic super power. Our decline can be traced directly to our abandonment of that model and our drift toward central planning, which has always failed and will continue to fail.
If they claim to be about free speech why didn't they just remove the content, why did they terminate accounts (which on YouTube means you are forever banned and it is a violation of their terms of service to EVER in your life to create another account!)?
The difference is like between censoring an article from the newspaper, and blowing up the newspaper office!
Google's handing of YouTube is scary.
The bans for 3 allegations of copyright infringement, which is NOT required by the DMCA, which says you have to terminate infringers, not those merely accused, now if a court say it was infringement that is different, but get 3 takedowns and you are banned are also scary.
Now you have the option to watch their propaganda, take a test and if you give the politically correct answers you can ask to be allowed back on.
At least if a search result on Google is blocked, they link to the order blocking it, and don't ban that person from ever having a web page in Google again or even ban the site! (which they do for black hat SEO).
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
"SOME forms of speech are not free, and should not be allowed: those that cause real harm to individuals."
Who defines "harm"? If someone hurts your feelings have they caused you harm? If someone advocates lifestyle choices that you deem unhealthy or even destructive (advice you don't want your kids to follow) have they caused "harm"? What about cases where exposing the truth causes "harm"?
Taking an absolutist position on free speech is no more simplistic than pretending you can draw a line through a giant gray area.
I actually think you're over-estimating the number of people who genuinely BELIEVE "anything goes". In my experience, that's more of a general philosophy and a sort of "tactical position". People who advocate for absolute free speech are often just approaching real world complexities from that starting point.
I also think this position is one of "holding the line" vs. pro-actively pushing for "anything goes" as a public policy objective. When for instance have people organized to repeal laws against slander or death threats?
For every 1 free speech fundamentalist, there are 100 government bureaucrats or other people who want to implement their own censorship pet projects, and another 10,000 people who don't give a damn. I think you need people who adopt the absolutist position as organized resistance to the various people who always want "just a little" restriction on free speech, because the sum of all those little restrictions is scary to contemplate.
i'm a committed capitalist
i just understand, unlike yourself, that there is a difference between capitalism and corporate oligarchy, which is exactly what you play into with your thinking
i also know that a strong central government is the only thing that actually makes a free market (as in fair market) work
and finally, and most importantly, i understand the difference between what the government is supposed to do, and the corruption of our government by special interests
you see the sickness, and you blame the patient, rather than the virus. and your solution is apparently to give the corruptors exactly what they want: less influence over their oligarchy, less recourse for the little guy
you really are a giant fool
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
actually, Wikileaks committed espionage. Or, if it's a U.S. citizen, treason.
Yeah, like Daniel Ellsberg and the New York Times? Or perhaps the military were being idiots when they gave the keys to the kingdom to a kid in uniform?
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit