Censorship of YouTube
Censorship of video-sharing platform YouTube occurs to varying degrees in many countries.
For censorship by YouTube itself, see Censorship by YouTube.
YouTube blocking occurs for a variety of reasons including:[1]
In some countries YouTube is completely blocked, either through a long-term standing ban or for more limited periods of time such as during periods of unrest, the run-up to an election, or in response to upcoming political anniversaries. In other countries, access to the website as a whole remains open, but access to specific videos is blocked due to many reasons including orders from country jurisdiction. In both cases, a VPN is usually deployed to bypass geographical restrictions. In cases where the entire site is banned due to one particular video, YouTube will often agree to remove or limit access to that video in order to restore service.[1]
As of September 2012, countries with standing national bans on YouTube include China, Iran, and Turkmenistan. Due to disputes between GEMA and YouTube over royalties, many videos featuring copyrighted songs were inaccessible in Germany. After an agreement was made between the companies in November 2016, these videos became accessible.[2][3]
YouTube's Terms of Service prohibit the posting of videos which violate copyrights or depict pornography, promoting racism, illegal acts, gratuitous violence, or hate speech. User-posted videos that violate such terms may be removed and replaced with a message stating: "This video is no longer available because its content violated YouTube's Terms of Service".[4] Additionally, Google reserves the right to terminate any account for any reason, even without notice.[5]
YouTube offers an opt-in feature known as "Restricted Mode", which filters videos that might contain mature content.[6]
Countries where access to YouTube was formerly blocked[edit]
Afghanistan[edit]
On September 12, 2012, YouTube was blocked in Afghanistan due to hosting the trailer to the controversial film about Muhammad, Innocence of Muslims, which the authorities considered to be blasphemous.[19] YouTube was later unblocked in Afghanistan on December 1 of the same year.[20]
Armenia[edit]
Following the disputed February 2008 presidential elections, the Armenian government blocked Internet users' access to YouTube for a month. The Armenian opposition had used the website to publicize video of alleged police brutality against anti-government protesters.[21][22]
Bangladesh[edit]
In March 2009, YouTube was blocked in Bangladesh after a recording of an alleged meeting between the prime minister and army officers was posted revealing anger by the military on how the government was handling a mutiny by border guards in Dhaka.[23] The block was lifted on March 21.[24]
On September 17, 2012, YouTube was banned for the second time following the controversies regarding the promotional videos for Innocence of Muslims.[25] On June 5, 2013, the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission lifted the ban.[26]
Brazil[edit]
In January 2007, YouTube was sued by Brazilian model and MTV VJ Daniella Cicarelli (the ex-fiancée of football player Ronaldo) and her boyfriend due to the fact that the website hosted a video recorded by paparazzi in which she and her boyfriend were having sexual intercourse on a Spanish beach; the video did not contain explicit content. The lawsuit asked that YouTube will be blocked in Brazil until all copies of the video were removed. On Saturday, January 6, 2007, a legal injunction ordered that filters be put in place to prevent users in Brazil from accessing the website.[27]
The effectiveness of the measure was questioned, since the video was available not only on YouTube, but also on other sites as part of an Internet phenomenon. On Tuesday, January 9, 2007, the same court overturned its previous decision, allowing the filters to be removed. The video footage itself remained banned and was to be removed from the website.[28]
In June 2007, a judge ordered Cicarelli and her boyfriend to pay all court and lawyer costs, as well as R$10,000 (roughly US$3,203) to the three defendants—YouTube, Globo, and iG, citing a lack of good faith in pushing the privacy case when their actions took place in public.[29]
Finland[edit]
On November 30, 2017, most YouTube videos containing music seemed to be blocked by Finnish nonprofit performance rights organization Teosto in Finland. According to them, Google blocked the videos because they did not have an agreement to show music videos in Finland. According to Teosto, they and Google have made a temporary agreement to show the videos in the morning of November 30. The music videos started to return to YouTube in Finland later that day.[30][31]