Google named on the 2019 Dirty Dozen List for facilitating sexual exploitation
Washington DC – According to Bloomberg, the Walt Disney Co., Nestle, and “Fortnite” creator Epic Games, Inc. are suspending advertising on YouTube after mounting concerns about the platform being used for the eroticization of children and for pedophile networking.
The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) is calling on YouTube to remove all pornography from its platform, and to create more proactive policies to combat sexual exploitation. Google has been placed on NCOSE’s 2019 Dirty Dozen List which names 12 mainstream facilitators of sexual exploitation.
“YouTube deserves to lose advertising money from Disney, and more, just as it deserves to lose the trust of its users,” said Haley Halverson, Vice President of Advocacy and Outreach at the National Center on Sexual Exploitation.
Why doesn’t Google’s YouTube take sexual exploitation and abuse seriously?” Halverson asked. “On YouTube, children are eroticized, pornographic content with disguised titles are shared, and predatory pedophiles use video comment sections to network and share illicit content. This has been happening for years. Why isn’t it YouTube’s #1 priority to create sustained solutions, instead of carrying on with its current whack-a-mole approach?”
“The National Center on Sexual Exploitation and other advocates have been trying to alert YouTube to these problems for years. In April 2018 YouTube was criticized for allowing a pornographic ad to appear on a trending YouTube video, and in November 2017 it was revealed that YouTube’s flagging system to prevent child victimization on its platform was reportedly malfunctioning for a year. Even the YouTubeKids app has been infiltrated with disturbing and often sexual content.”
A previous statement from NCOSE on YouTube’s child erotica can be found here.
