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YouTube says it will switch off comments on almost all videos featuring under-18s, in an attempt to "better protect children and families".

Several brands stopped advertising on YouTube after discovering that paedophiles were leaving predatory comments on videos of children.

YouTube had originally disabled comments on videos that were attracting predatory and obscene comments.

But it will now disable comments on almost all videos of minors by default.

It said the change would take effect over several months.

What was happening?

The BBC first reported that paedophiles were leaving explicit comments on YouTube videos back in 2017.

As well as leaving obscene or sexual comments, they were also using the comments section to signal content of interest to other paedophiles.

At the time, YouTube said it was "working urgently" to clean up the site.

However, in February this year advertisers including AT&T, Nestle and Hasbro suspended their ads after more predatory activity was found.

What has YouTube announced?

In a blog post, YouTube said its new policy meant videos of very young children would automatically have the comments section disabled.

The move is likely to include videos of toddlers uploaded by parents, as well as short films featuring children by established YouTube stars.

Videos of older children and teenagers will typically not have the comments disabled, unless a specific video is likely to attract predatory attention. That could include, for example, a video of a teenager doing gymnastics.

YouTube told the BBC it would use algorithms to detect which videos contained children.

Millions of hours of footage are uploaded to YouTube every day.

When will comments be permitted?

A small number of YouTube content creators will be allowed to enable comments on videos featuring children.

These channels will be trusted partners such as family video-bloggers or known YouTube stars.

However, they will be required to actively moderate their comments and demonstrate that their videos carry a low risk of attracting predatory comments.

YouTube said it had developed a system that was better at detecting predatory comments and removing them.

Previously, it had said it would stop video-makers earning ad revenue if paedophiles left explicit comments on their videos, but this will no longer be necessary.

What further action is being taken?

In addition to updating its comments policy, YouTube said it had terminated several channels that were "endangering" children.

The ban included several channels that were adding shocking content in the middle of children's cartoons.

It named FilthyFrankClips as one of the banned channels. It had released a video instructing children how to cut themselves.

"Nothing is more important to us than ensuring the safety of young people on the platform," said YouTube chief executive Susan Wojcicki on Twitter.

YouTube's app for children - YouTube Kids - has been criticised for using algorithms to curate content. Inappropriate videos have repeatedly been discovered on the service.

How have creators responded?

The comments left by fans on YouTube videos help the platform's algorithms decide which videos to serve up and recommend to viewers.

Creators have expressed concern that being forced to disable comments on their videos will affect the growth of their channels.

Despite the wide-ranging new policy, comments will remain part of the recommendation algorithm.

"We understand that comments are an important way creators build and connect with their audiences," YouTube said in a statement. "We also know that this is the right thing to do to protect the YouTube community."

Andy Burrows from the child protection charity NSPCC said the announcement was an "important step".

"We know that offenders are twisting YouTube videos for their own sexual gratification, using them to contact other predators and using the comments section as shop window to child abuse image sites," he said.

However, he called for an "independent statutory regulator" that could "force social networks to follow the rules or face tough consequences".</s>YouTube is taking new steps to increase child safety on the video-sharing platform.

The Google-owned firm announced Thursday that it will turn off comments on all videos that feature minors.

The decision comes as YouTube found itself ensnared in a child exploitation controversy, wherein pedophiles were discovered to be leaving predatory comments on videos featuring young minors.

YouTube acknowledged that comments are a 'core part of the YouTube experience,' but that disabling them would be 'critical for keeping young people safe.'

'Over the past week, we have disabled comments from tens of millions of videos that could be subject to predatory behavior,' the company said in a blog post.

'These efforts are focused on videos featuring young minors and we will continue to identify videos at risk over the next few months.

'...We will be broadening this action to suspend comments on videos featuring young minors and videos featuring older minors that could be at risk of attracting predatory behavior,' the firm continued.

Some channels will still be allowed to have comments enabled on videos featuring minors, but they'll be 'required to actively moderate their comments,' in addition to YouTube's AI moderators.

It hopes to open up comments on these types of videos for more channels over time.

Companies including Nestle and the makers of Fortnite have pulled their adverts from YouTube after a 'soft-core pedophile ring' was discovered on the site. Videos of youngsters, sometimes in compromising positions, are being inundated with comments by paedophiles and attracting tens of millions of views, it has been claimed. Some of the disturbing footage, reportedly featuring girls as young as five, appeared alongside advertising from companies such as Disney and Nestle, according to a US-based vlogger. Matt Watson, who posts videos to his channel MattsWhatItIs, claimed to have found a 'wormhole' into a 'soft-core paedophile ring' on the site. There were instances, he said, where paedophiles were targeting videos of young girls on the site and using the comments section to make suggestive remarks and flag moments when the girls appeared in compromising positions, such as when performing gymnastics. He said in some cases, he uncovered links to child pornography posted in comments, which had been deleted when reported to YouTube.

YouTube is also ramping up its focus on launching more advanced AI moderating technology.

The moderating technology is capable of identifying and removing predatory comments, according to the firm.

YouTube 'accelerated' the classifier's launch and now has a new version in place that is 'more sweeping in scope.'

It's also capable of identifying and removing double the amount of comments compared to the previous version.

The firm also addressed issues with users uploading harmful videos catered toward minors.

'No form of content that endangers minors is acceptable on YouTube, which is why we have terminated certain channels that attempt to endanger children in any way,' YouTube explained.

'We will continue to take action when creators violate our policies in ways that blatantly harm the broader user and creator community. Please continue to flag these to us.'

The controversy erupted last week when YouTuber Matt Watson, who posts videos to his channel MattsWhatItIs, claimed to have found a 'wormhole' into a 'soft-core pedophile ring' on the site.

Pedophiles would comment on the videos with timestamps linking to when children were shown in sexually suggestive positions and would also link to other videos.

In turn, YouTube's algorithms would recommend videos related to those topics.

Advertisers weren't happy about the revelation and quickly ended their advertising spending on the site.

Disney, Nestle, AT&T and Epic Games, the company behind Fortnite, all suspended their advertising on YouTube.

It's also not the first case of YouTube being in hot water over child safety issues.

In 2017, the firm received backlash after it was revealed that creators were publishing videos to YouTube Kids with inappropriate and, at times, disturbing scenes.</s>Google-owned video platform YouTube has disabled the comments on “tens of millions of videos” featuring minors, in an attempt to curb sexual predators on the platform.

In a blog post, which was shared by YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, YouTube announced the steps it had taken “to protect young people on YouTube,” and “improve child safety.”

“Over the past week, we disabled comments from tens of millions of videos that could be subject to predatory behavior. These efforts are focused on videos featuring young minors and we will continue to identify videos at risk over the next few months,” YouTube declared. “Over the next few months, we will be broadening this action to suspend comments on videos featuring young minors and videos featuring older minors that could be at risk of attracting predatory behavior.”

“A small number of creators will be able to keep comments enabled on these types of videos. These channels will be required to actively moderate their comments, beyond just using our moderation tools, and demonstrate a low risk of predatory behavior,” the company continued. “We will work with them directly and our goal is to grow this number over time as our ability to catch violative comments continues to improve.”

YouTube also claimed to have “been working on an even more effective classifier, that will identify and remove predatory comments.”

“No form of content that endangers minors is acceptable on YouTube, which is why we have terminated certain channels that attempt to endanger children in any way. Videos encouraging harmful and dangerous challenges targeting any audience are also clearly against our policies,” YouTube concluded. “We will continue to take action when creators violate our policies in ways that blatantly harm the broader user and creator community. Please continue to flag these to us.”

Last week, YouTube faced heavy criticism from content creators after it claimed that “inappropriate comments” left by other users on videos could result in the video becoming demonetized.

Content creators pointed out to YouTube that they could have their income taken away if trolls, or critics, decided to purposefully leave “inappropriate” comments on their videos.

YouTube launched its comments system changes following reports of many sexual predators on the platform, who were found to be making sexual comments on videos featuring children.

The reports of YouTube’s pedophile problem led to several major advertisers pulling their ads, including McDonald’s, Nestlé, and Epic Games, and forced YouTube to take action.</s>YouTube has announced a few sweeping changes of involving on the platform.

In on the YouTube Creator Blog, the company laid out the actions being taken. The biggest update: YouTube will now disable comments on all videos featuring minors.

YouTube states that this change will be rolled out over the next few months. Comments will be disabled on all videos featuring young minors as well as videos with older minors that “could be at risk of attracting predatory behavior.”

Select creators that would otherwise be affected by this change will be allowed to keep comments enabled on their videos. They will be required to actively moderate their comments and keep predatory content off their video pages. YouTube will work with them to provide guidance.

In a statement provided to Mashable, a YouTube spokesperson said:

“Over the past week, we’ve been taking a number of steps to better protect children and families, including suspending comments on tens of millions of videos. Now, we will begin suspending comments on most videos that feature minors, with the exception of a small number of channels that actively moderate their comments and take additional steps to protect children. We understand that comments are an important way creators build and connect with their audiences, we also know that this is the right thing to do to protect the YouTube community.”

Last week, YouTube suspended comments on tens of millions of videos following a on the platform. Child predators were using the comments section on videos featuring kids to link to moments in the video where the minor could be found in compromising positions. The comments also included contacts where pedophiles could trade child pornography off of YouTube’s platform.

Along with disabling comments on videos featuring minors, YouTube also announced that it sped up the launch of a “more effective” classifier which can identify and remove double the amount of individual predatory comments than before.

YouTube has also terminated accounts that attempt to harm children, like the FilthyFrankClips channel which was behind the which gave suicide tips to kids. The video platform says they will continue to take action and ban users who violate their policies.

These actions taken by YouTube clearly signal how seriously the company takes these issues. However, with the sheer amount of video content uploaded to YouTube every day, disabling comments as the default on every clip featuring a minor seems like a daunting task. For one, how can YouTube automatically identify whether a video features a child? What's the difference between a "younger minor" and an "older minor?" How did the company determine which creators were allowed to keep comments enabled?

Mashable reached out to YouTube for answers to the above questions and will update this when we hear back.</s>YouTube said it’s banning comments on some videos featuring minors, responding to criticism and the loss of advertisers after the service was used by potential predators to exploit children.

The Google unit, one of the world’s largest video services, disabled comments from tens of millions of videos “that could be subject to predatory behaviour” and will continue to identify similar troubling videos in coming months, the company said Thursday in an unsigned blog post.

“We will be broadening this action to suspend comments on videos featuring young minors and videos featuring older minors that could be at risk of attracting predatory behaviour,” YouTube added.

Pulling comments from YouTube is a big step. Video creators use the comments section to communicate with viewers, find new ones and get feedback. It’s also a major part of what makes YouTube social.

“It basically destroys the community,” said Jacob Strickling, who makes online videos about science that run on YouTube. He expects it to have a “massive impact” on those videos’ views as fans find themselves unable to communicate with each other through the comments section. “They will leave YouTube and go to platforms like Facebook where they can continue their commenting and banter.”

YouTube is using an artificial intelligence technique called machine learning to build the software that will automatically select which videos will have comments suspended, a spokeswoman said. Clips that include kids of 13 and younger will have the comments section removed. Videos featuring children aged 14 to 17 with subjects with potential for abuse, like gymnastics, will also see their comments disabled.

YouTube has used AI software to classify videos and identify specific content, but the system has had mixed results, including recommending conspiracy theories and other questionable information.

Several large advertisers, including AT&T Inc. and Kellogg Co., pulled spending from YouTube last week after comments on the service were used to identify video clips of young girls participating in activities such as posing in front of a mirror and doing gymnastics. Comments under the videos suggested potential predators were bookmarking certain points and sharing them with others. If users clicked on the clips, YouTube’s software recommended similar ones.

Episodes like this are forcing YouTube to rely less on automation and more on human monitoring and curation. On Thursday, the site said that a small number of creators can keep comments enabled on videos featuring minors only if they actively moderate the comments and “demonstrate a low risk of predatory behaviour.” That will be time consuming and expensive. YouTube’s parent, Google, is a unit of Alphabet Inc.</s>Alphabet Inc's YouTube said on Thursday it had disabled comments on videos featuring minors, a week after a magazine reported the platform displayed ads next to videos that showed exploitation of children.

REUTERS: Alphabet Inc's YouTube said on Thursday it had disabled comments on videos featuring minors, a week after a magazine reported the platform displayed ads next to videos that showed exploitation of children.

"Over the past week, we disabled comments from tens of millions of videos that could be subject to predatory behaviour," YouTube said in a blog https://youtube-creators.googleblog.com/2019/02/more-updates-on-our-actions-related-to.html post.

The report by Wired magazine said that commercials ran alongside offensive videos and comments prompted companies such as food and beverage maker Nestle SA and carrier AT&T Inc to pause advertising on YouTube earlier this week.

"While we have been removing hundreds of millions of comments for violating our policies, we had been working on an even more effective classifier, that will identify and remove predatory comments," YouTube said.</s>Following a week of controversy, YouTube has said it will disable comments on videos featuring minors.

In a post hosted on YouTube’s creator blog, the company said it will begin suspending comments on videos featuring both younger and older children – an expansion from its initial policy, which included only younger children.

A new comments classifier is being developed that will not affect a video’s monetisation and is meant to remove twice the amount of egregious comments as the current system.

Additionally, a small number of creators will be allowed to keep comments enabled on videos featuring minors, but the process for choosing which channels have this privilege has not yet been announced.

These changes come after some companies, including Disney and McDonald’s, pulled their advertising from YouTube in the wake of predatory comments on videos featuring minors.

YouTube Kids, which is marketed as a kid-friendly version of YouTube, has also come under scrutiny recently for its safety, with multiple outlets reporting that self-harm and dangerous challenges have been found in YouTube clips of Peppa Pig on the app.</s>After beginning the process of disabling comments on videos featuring young minors on its platform last week, YouTube have decided to extend the block to those with older minors, in an effort to curb predatory behaviour on its site.

Over the past week, YouTube said it suspended comments from tens of millions of videos that had posed risks to such behaviour. The extension, which will see children up to the age of 18 covered, will come into place over the next few months.

"A small number of creators will be able to keep comments enabled on these types of videos," YouTube said in a blog post. "These channels will be required to actively moderate their comments, beyond just using our moderation tools, and demonstrate a low risk of predatory behaviour."

See also: How to make YouTube Kids safer for your children (CNET)

YouTube said it would work with creators directly, with the goal of growing the number over time as it improves its ability to catch inappropriate comments.

The Alphabet-owned company is also launching a new comments classifier that will identify and remove predatory comments, with YouTube promising the detection and consequential removal of twice as many comments.

Additionally, YouTube said it intends to take action on creators who cause "egregious harm" to the community.

"No form of content that endangers minors is acceptable on YouTube, which is why we have terminated certain channels that attempt to endanger children in any way," the blog continued.

"Videos encouraging harmful and dangerous challenges targeting any audience are also clearly against our policies. We will continue to take action when creators violate our policies in ways that blatantly harm the broader user and creator community."

YouTube has classified the following as harmful content: Sexualisation of minors, which includes sexually explicit content featuring minors and content that sexually exploits minors; harmful or dangerous acts involving minors, such as that showing a minor participating in dangerous activity, or encouraging minors to engage in dangerous activities; infliction of emotional distress on minors, including content that could cause participants or viewers distress; misleading family content, videos misleading viewers by appearing to be family content, but containing sexual themes, violence, obscene, or other mature themes not suitable for young audiences; and cyberbullying and harassment involving minors.

If content violates YouTube's policy, it will be removed and an email will be sent to the creator.

A warning for a first offence will be given, with no penalty. Once three strikes have been tallied, the channel will be terminated.

YouTube last week had already begun limiting the monetisation of videos that include minors, with those flagged as at risk receiving limited or no ads, and made known through the use of a yellow icon.

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Videos uploaded as private or unlisted are subject to being crawled, but Google's documentation does not acknowledge this behavior at all.</s>Just a week after some of its major advertising partners pulled ads from the platform, YouTube has just announced that it will be disabling comments on all videos featuring minors. This comes as a response to the discovery that some users were using the comments section of videos featuring children as a sort of “soft-core pedophilia ring.”

If you’ll recall earlier this month, a video posted revealed that some users were taking advantage of YouTube’s comments system to identify certain videos and timestamps within a video that showed minors in suggestive positions and situations.

Over the past week, YouTube says that it has disabled the comments on millions of videos which could be subject to predatory behavior. YouTube announced today in a blog post that, over the coming months, it will be expanding that action to suspend comments on videos which feature minors, both young and old, that could be at risk.

YouTube explains that this action won’t affect all creators, but that a chosen few will be able to retain comments. Apparently, those channels will need to closely moderate their comments and ensure that their content is at low risk of attracting such predatory behavior in the first place.

Over the past week, we disabled comments from tens of millions of videos that could be subject to predatory behavior. These efforts are focused on videos featuring young minors and we will continue to identify videos at risk over the next few months. Over the next few months, we will be broadening this action to suspend comments on videos featuring young minors and videos featuring older minors that could be at risk of attracting predatory behavior. A small number of creators will be able to keep comments enabled on these types of videos. These channels will be required to actively moderate their comments, beyond just using our moderation tools, and demonstrate a low risk of predatory behavior. We will work with them directly and our goal is to grow this number over time as our ability to catch violative comments continues to improve.

Further, YouTube says that the platform is adopting a new, more effective comments classifier. This classifier doesn’t affect the monetization of a video and is meant to identify and remove predatory comments. Apparently, the launch has been “accelerated” and with the classifier in place, 2x the individual comments can be detected and removed.

While we have been removing hundreds of millions of comments for violating our policies, we had been working on an even more effective classifier, that will identify and remove predatory comments. This classifier does not affect the monetization of your video. We accelerated its launch and now have a new comments classifier in place that is more sweeping in scope, and will detect and remove 2X more individual comments.
• Companies including Disney, Nestle pull YouTube ads from reports of comments section used for child videos
• YouTube isn’t banning giveaways, but the platform is cracking down on inflated engagement metrics

Check out 9to5Google on YouTube for more news:</s>YouTube has been at the center of a great deal of controversy recently, with videos aimed at children said to include messages encouraging self harm, and pedophile rings operating in the comments sections of supposedly ‘kid-friendly’ content.

Unsurprisingly, this has caused a great deal of public backlash, along with many high-profile companies having pulled their advertisements from the platform, but today YouTube has promised a slew of changes that aim to remedy to the problem.

In a on YouTube’s Creator Blog, the video streaming service announced that it has begun removing the ability to comment on videos containing “young minors”, with “tens of millions” of videos already affected.

“We will continue to identify videos at risk over the next few months,” YouTube stated. “We will be broadening this action to suspend comments on [...] videos featuring older minors that could be at risk of attracting predatory behavior”.

While some select creators will still be able to retain comments on their videos, they will have to monitor their comments rigorously for nefarious comments, and “demonstrate a low risk of predatory behavior”.

Prevention is the best cure

On top of the manual work YouTube has done in removing “hundreds of millions of comments”, it has also developed a new classifier with a broader scope that helps to automatically detect and remove twice as many comments that violate policy as was previously possible.

To cap off the post, YouTube has declared that it has “terminated certain channels that attempt to endanger children in any way” and will continue to do so as they are discovered, in part with the help of users posts.
YouTube announces that it will turn off comments on videos featuring children under the age of 18 after reports that a pedophile ring was operating in the comment sections of videos featuring minors, which subsequently led AT&T, Nestlé and Hasbro to suspend advertisements on the website.