The logo of video-sharing website YouTube is displayed on a smartphone on November 19, 2018 in Berlin, Germany.
Thomas Trutschel | Photothek via Getty Images
YouTube said on Thursday that it’s cracking down on videos containing abortion misinformation and will take down videos deemed unsafe.
“Starting today and ramping up over the next few weeks, we will remove content that provides instructions for unsafe abortion methods or promotes false claims about abortion safety under our medical misinformation policies,” the company said in a tweet.
YouTube parent Google has come under fire in recent months after a group of lawmakers began urging the company to clamp down on search results that allegedly steer people looking for abortion services to crisis pregnancy centers opposing abortion. Google announced earlier this month that it will work to quickly delete location history for people going to abortion sites and other medical sites following the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade.
“Like all of our policies on health/medical topics, we rely on published guidance from health authorities,” YouTube said on Thursday. “We prioritize connecting people to content from authoritative sources on health topics, and we continuously review our policies & products as real world events unfold.”
The company said it’s also launching an “information panel” to provide “viewers with context and information from local and global health authorities.” That will show up underneath...
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