It has clearly become a conduit for rightwing hate sites and it must urgently take action.” 
 
 Google alters search autocomplete to remove 'are Jews evil' suggestion Read more 
 
 The Observer found that searches for “are jews” were offering the suggestion “are jews evil”, and nine out of the 10 top results gave links to rightwing antisemitic hate sites. And this is what it did. “They’ve gone on in the fly and plugged the plug on certain search terms in response to your article, but this raises bigger and more difficult questions. A Google spokesperson said: “We took action within hours of being notified on Friday of the autocomplete results.” Google did not comment on its decision to alter some but not all those raised in the article. Frank Pasquale, professor of law at the University of Maryland, and one of the leading academic figures calling for tech companies to be more open and transparent, calls the results “very profound, very troubling”. And the way in which you see the results and the types of results you see on the page necessarily has an impact on your perspective.” Fake news, he says, has simply “revealed a much bigger problem. Google declined to explain why the results occurred but a spokesperson said: “Some inappropriate results are surfacing in Google Maps that should not be, and we apologise for any offence this may have caused.” 
 
 In April this year Google apologised after a search for “unprofessional hairstyles for work” yielded image results showing predominantly black women with natural hair, while searching for “professional” ones returned pictures of coiffed, white women. The top eight out of 10 results for the Google search “was Hitler bad?”, for example, are links to Holocaust denial sites including the neo-Nazi site, StormFront.org. Google is doing a horrible, horrible job of delivering answers here. This is Google’s algorithm going terribly wrong.” 
 
 I contacted Google about its seemingly malfunctioning autocomplete suggestions and received the following response: “Our search results are a reflection of the content across the web. This means that sometimes, unpleasant portrayals of sensitive subject-matter online can affect what search results appear for a given query. As a company, we strongly value a diversity of perspectives, ideas and cultures.” 
 
 
 
 Danny Sullivan, the editor of Search Engine Land and one of the leading authorities on Google search, said Google faced a “very difficult, very challenging issue”. Users search for such a wide range of material on the web – 15% of searches we see every day are new. They’re sending out thousands of links to other sites and together this has created a vast satellite system of rightwing news and propaganda that has completely surrounded the mainstream media system.” 
 
 He found 23,000 pages and 1.3m hyperlinks. Google refused to comment on the individual search results, but on Sunday, it moved to change some but not all of the autocomplete suggestions that the report highlighted. Albright’s research has shown that fake news and information is a far bigger structural problem than had been previously realised. Here, Albright shows it is a “vast satellite system of rightwing news and propaganda that has completely surrounded the mainstream media system”. “Twenty years ago, these sites with these views … they would have been completely shut out by the mainstream press, but we have replaced our guardians of information with algorithms that are dumb and that can be toyed with and manipulated.” 
 
 Jonathan Albright, assistant professor of communications at Elon University, North Carolina, said that rightwing websites had launched a new “information war”, and that that they were winning. She said: “There’s a a growing list of social media empires that have been attempting with all their power and might to claim that they don’t have editorial responsibility, but they have been proven wrong. “They have been proven wrong by this troll army, and quite clearly when it comes to the questions that require a subtle understanding of the truth versus lies, they are going to have to use human judgment. Google, democracy and the truth about internet search Read more 
 
 On Monday the searches for Jews and women no longer returned those results, although the “are Muslims bad” autocomplete was still present. It is a concern they really need to solve.” It can and does change search results when it suits them. O’Neil said that she believed Google would ultimately have to hire human editors. But that’s simply a mechanised editorial function.” 
 
 And the companies, says John Naughton, the Observer columnist and a senior research fellow at Cambridge University, are terrified of acquiring editorial responsibilities they don’t want. “Though they can and regularly do tweak the results in all sorts of ways.” 
 
 Certainly the results about Google on Google don’t seem entirely neutral. “It is clearly very frightening what is going on here. They know your likes, dislikes, where you live, what you eat, what makes you laugh, what makes you cry. Photograph: Mariana Bazo/Reuters 
 
 “At the moment, there’s a distance when you Google ‘Jews are’ and get ‘Jews are evil’,” says Julia Powles, a researcher at Cambridge on technology and law. “Autocomplete predictions are algorithmically generated based on users’ search activity and interests. Google’s autocomplete feature aims to suggest common searches after a user enters one or more words into the site’s search box or address bar of its Chrome browser.
– Google will no longer offer a search suggestion for "are Jews evil" which directs users to anti-Semitic websites. The search engine says it has removed offensive autocomplete results initially spotted by Carole Cadwalladr at the Observer, reports the Guardian. Cadwalladr explained how Google suggested a search for "are Jews evil" when "are Jews" was typed into its search box. Typing "are women" and "are Muslims" returned "are women evil" and "are Muslims bad," Cadwalladr said. Clicking those suggestions took her to page results that would lead one to conclude that "Jews are evil. Women are evil. Islam must be destroyed. Hitler was one of the good guys," Cadwalladr added. An answer box highlighted by Google even explained that "every woman has some degree of prostitute in her." A data scientist urged Google to take action, noting it had "clearly become a conduit for right-wing hate sites" and a victim of "the troll army," per the Guardian. "It is clearly very frightening what is going on here." Most of the offensive autocomplete results spotted by Cadwalladr have since been erased—"are women equal to men" was among them, per CBS News—though "are Muslims bad" is still a suggestion. Google says it tries "to prevent offensive terms, like porn and hate speech, from appearing," but "autocomplete predictions are algorithmically generated based on users' search activity and interests" and "may be unexpected or unpleasant." That said, "we acknowledge that autocomplete isn't an exact science and we're always working to improve our algorithms." (Google previously suggested Wisconsin was "stupid.")