YouTube Suspends Payments to 14 Brazilian Accounts Over Election Disinformation

Most of the YouTube channels offer regular full-throated support to Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro.

By Reuters | Updated: 27 August 2021 11:41 IST

YouTube Suspends Payments to 14 Brazilian Accounts Over Election Disinformation

In July, YouTube said it had removed videos from Bolsonaro's channel for spreading misinformation

Highlights

The president is down in the polls
Last year, both Twitter and Facebook took down videos of Bolsonaro
This was for breaching their terms of use

YouTube said on Thursday it had suspended payments to content producers from 14 channels accused of spreading fake news about next year's election by the country's federal electoral court, the TSE.

Most of the channels offer regular full-throated support to President Jair Bolsonaro, a far-right former army captain who has been sowing doubts about the credibility of next year's vote. The president is down in the polls after overseeing the world's second deadliest coronavirus outbreak and a weak economy.

"We reinforce our commitment to collaborating with the work of authorities in Brazil and to continue to invest in policies, resources and products to protect the YouTube community from harmful content," Alphabet's YouTube said in a statement announcing the move.

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Last week, the inspector general of electoral justice, Luis Felipe Salomão, ordered YouTube, Twitch.TV, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to suspend payments to people and pages that were spreading disinformation about the Brazilian electoral system.

In July, YouTube said it had removed videos from Bolsonaro's channel for spreading misinformation about the coronavirus outbreak, becoming the latest tech giant to pull his pandemic pronouncements.

Last year, both Twitter and Facebook took down videos of Bolsonaro for breaching their terms of use after he made pronouncements that went against the recommendations of global public health experts.

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© Thomson Reuters 2021

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