A SUIT filed this week in federal court accused YouTube of discriminating against African-American video makers and viewers by factoring in race when it comes to filtering or monetising content.

The suit, filed in a courthouse in the Silicon Valley city of San Jose on Tuesday, seeks class action status and names as defendants the leading video-sharing platform and its parent companies, Google and Alphabet.

“Under the pretext of finding that videos violate some vague, ambiguous and non- specific content rule, the defendants use computer-driven racial, identity and viewpoint profiling and filtering tools to restrict, censor and denigrate” blacks, said the suit.

YouTube uses metadata and other “:signals” from videos to make decisions on filtering content or placing money-making advertising based on race, it added.

“The defendants continue to knowingly, intentionally and systematically block, demonetise and deny plaintiffs and other persons similarly situated their contractual and other legal rights to access YouTube based on the colour of their skin or other protected racial traits, rather than the material in their videos.”

Triggers for YouTube’s filtering software include tags on videos referencing white supremacy, police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement, said the suit.

YouTube did not immediately return a request for comment.

Google yesterday boosted to US$1 billion (RM4.3 billion) the amount of free advertising it will give non-profits this year, taking special interest in groups combating racism and the damage done by the coronavirus pandemic.

It has also committed US$275 million to help black artistes on YouTube, and fund African-American small businesses and other projects. – AFP, June 19, 2020.