Amid boycott, Google changes ad policy to give advertisers more control

Enlarge (credit: Philippe Huguen/Getty Images)

Last week, the UK government halted taxpayer-funded advertising on YouTube and Google because some of its ads appeared on extremist content. Today, Google responded as more companies pulled advertising from its platform. Google's Chief Business Officer Philipp Schindler explained in a blog post how the company will revamp its advertising policies to give companies more control over where their ads appear on YouTube and the Google Display Network. Schindler also signals a new epoch for Google and YouTube, one in which the company will focus more effort on preventing hate speech on its online video platform.

Schindler outlines three ways Google will be tweaking its ad policy. First, the company will remove ads from "hateful, offensive and derogatory content," or any content that's geared toward "attacking or harassing people based on their race, religion, gender or similar categories." This will begin immediately, and it basically means Google will effectively demonetize any extremist content it can find on its platform.

Second, Google will do more to ensure advertisements will show up on content made by creators in its YouTube Partners Program and not channels that impersonate or exploit those real members.

Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments