Google has made a pretty big move in its fight against the spread of false information by blocking all anti-vaxxing content on YouTube. The move began when YouTube began removing videos and content that falsely reported on Covid-19 vaccines, and following the removal of over 130,000 videos, YouTube is expanding its policies to cover other vaccines as well.
Revealed in a blog post by Google, the tech giant stated, "Working closely with health authorities, we looked to balance our commitment to an open platform with the need to remove egregious harmful content. We've steadily seen false claims about the coronavirus vaccines spill over into misinformation about vaccines in general, and we're now at a point where it's more important than ever to expand the work we started with COVID-19 to other vaccines."
Google did note that this specifically targets content that "falsely alleges that approved vaccines are dangerous and cause chronic health effects, claims that vaccines do not reduce transmission or contraction of disease, or contains misinformation on the substances contained in vaccines". The new policy also covers routine immunisations and even general information about vaccines, as it looks to lock down on the false information spreading over the site.
Google has noted that the situation is a challenging one to approach and therefore will not be enforcing content blocks or bans on videos that debate the scientific process, vaccine policies, vaccine trials, and historical vaccine successes or failures, and even that personal stories about the vaccine will be allowed, provided they don't break the community guidelines that are now in effect.
It was also briefly noted at the end of the blog post that Google intends to continue investing in new policies and products that bring "high quality information" to its viewers in the future.