In the world of YouTube, the popular platform for sharing videos, there’s been a lot happening lately. Between January and March 2023, a surprising number of 1.9 million videos were removed from the Indian section of the site. This action was taken because these videos were breaking the rules set by YouTube to keep things safe and respectful.
On a global scale, YouTube has gotten rid of more than 6.48 million videos because they didn’t follow the rules. At the same time, they’ve also shut down over 8.7 million channels that were caught doing things like creating fake or misleading content, or trying to game the system with spammy videos and comments.
They also cleaned up the comments section by deleting a massive 853 million comments. Most of these comments were just spam, cluttering up the platform. Interestingly, more than 99 percent of these spammy comments were identified and removed automatically by computer programs, without human involvement.
YouTube shared a message about this effort. They talked about how they’ve worked hard to create rules and tools to make the platform a safe and positive place. They noted that most content creators follow the rules and make good stuff. They believe that educating creators helps reduce the number of people who accidentally break the rules.
Interestingly, more than 93 percent of the videos taken down were first flagged by computers, not people. And here’s a twist: about 69 percent of these videos, which were removed by computers, had less than ten views before they were removed. Of the videos spotted by computers, 31 percent had just one to ten views, and 38 percent were removed before anyone could even watch them.
Since 2019, YouTube started giving a warning for the first time someone breaks a rule. This helps creators learn and improve before facing stronger penalties. Because of this, over 80 percent of creators who got a warning didn’t break any more rules.
