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Self-Harm Clips Hidden in Kids' Cartoons (bbc.com)

Posted by msmash on from the growing-concerns dept.

Children's charity the NSPCC has accused YouTube of failing to tackle dangerous content on its youth channel. From a report: YouTube Kids, dubbed as a safer, child-friendly version of the video-sharing site, has been criticised by parents for failing to remove cartoons that contain clips depicting suicide methods on its platform. The clips show a YouTuber demonstrating a suicide method. Google told the BBC it works hard to remove such content. "We have strict policies that prohibit videos which promote self-harm. We rely on both user-flagging and smart-detection technology to flag this content for our reviewers," the firm said in a statement. "We are always working to improve our systems and to remove violat[ing] content more quickly." It is unclear how or why the clips depicting suicide methods were embedded in children's cartoons. The BBC has received no response from the YouTuber. It also asked Google, which owns YouTube, if it had spoken to him directly but did not get a reply.

3 of 155 comments (clear)

  1. Easy answer by Nidi62 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It is unclear...why the clips depicting suicide methods were embedded in children's cartoons.

    People are dicks.

    --
    The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
  2. Can't Promise Curated Content and Not Curate It by Koreantoast · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Should be important to note that this is not talking about YouTube in general but specifically a product that the company setup promising carefully curated content for children. If you're going to create a curated set of programs intentionally marketed toward children, they really should be reviewing videos before putting them on the app versus just hoping detection algorithms and self-reporting are going to catch clips spliced in. For this kind of program, once your credibility is shot, you're not going to recover anytime in the near future.

  3. Re:Or you could just get over it by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Shielding your kids from it is largely pointless. You're better off just explaining it to them to the limits of their understanding.

    That depends on the age of the kid. There is not much a 13 year-old needs to be sheltered from. But there is plenty a 5 year-old should not see.

    YouTube kids to targeted at 3 to 8 year olds. The "shielding" is its raison d'etre.