🐱 Google alters algorithm to remove Holocaust denial search results

http://indianexpress.com/article/te...move-holocaust-denial-search-results-4446974/

Google has changed its algorithm to completely remove Holocaust denial results for the query ‘Did the Holocaust happen?’. Google Search, which earlier showed link to a Stormfront’s article on 10 reasons why the Holocaust didn’t happen, has removed that result and other similar Holocaust denial sites. Stormfront is a neo-Nazi, white supremacist website. Digital Trends quoted a spokesperson from Google, who said, “Judging which pages on the web best answer a query is a challenging problem and we don’t always get it right.”
Google’s u-turn comes after it had earlier said it won’t be removing the result. In an earlier comment to Fortune magazine, Google has said it does “not remove content from search results, except in very limited cases such as illegal content, malware and violations of our webmaster guidelines.” But now it looks like Google is cracking down on this sort of content, which spreads false information.

Google has altered its search results in the past as well. The search giant removed phrases like ‘are jews evil’, ‘are muslims bad’ and ‘are women evil’ from the autocomplete feature in the search box after a Guardian report had highlighted these. However search results from websites around topics like these still continue to figure in Google search results. Many of these are from white-supremacist websites, which spew racial, religious hatred against minority communities, women.

In fact as the Gizmodo reports points out if you search on phrases like ‘are jews evil’ etc, results from Stormfront still appear in the first page. A query on ‘Are Muslims evil’ also include anti-Muslim articles in the first page of results itself.

However, a Google spokesperson in a statement to Gizmodo said the company will continue to make changes to its algorithm over time to ‘tackle such challenges’. Whether this means that in future misleading websites with false information get removed altogether from results remains to be seen.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Holocaust Denial is retarded since its literally the most documented event of all time but this is retarded and clearly a trial run for censoring more and more shit, next it's gonna be climate change "denial" and they are gonna push harder and harder to make sure all wrongthinks and places like this are disappeared.

 

[RG 448]

There's some nice irony to Holocaust denial being denied, but crazy people are on the same level as burning yourself on a hot surface as a child. You to experience it in order to learn how to deal with it.

 

[Cuck Norris]

Oy Vey the goyim know, shut it down!

 

[OwO What's This?]

Holocaust Denial is exceptional since its literally the most documented event of all time but this is exceptional and clearly a trial run for censoring more and more shit, next it's gonna be climate change "denial" and they are gonna push harder and harder to make sure all wrongthinks and places like this are disappeared.

you're probably right, but on the other hand, it could be just part of the crackdown on 'fake news'

 

[AnOminous]

Next, other forms of "fake news" and badthought.

Google has never needed a competitor as a search engine more than now.

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

There is indeed a crusade going on inside large tech companies against fake news stories, usually not entirely backed by the executives (for necessary PR reasons), but set in motion by the engineers themselves. A lot of engineers feel they're responsible for the spread of fake news because the tools they created enable it, and push hard inside large tech companies to be allowed to do more to counter it. What you're seeing here is likely a result of that internal push happening at Google.

Personally, I don't think removing search results entirely is the way to do it, as that feels like censorship. I prefer Facebook's solution where they put (or have said they're going to at least) a warning above the article saying it's a questionable source, but still allow you to see it.

 

[CatParty]

Google has never needed a competitor as a search engine more than now.

www.askjeeves.com

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Next, other forms of "fake news" and badthought.

Google has never needed a competitor as a search engine more than now.

They are really intent on making "reality has a left-wing bias" a reality by censoring and deleting everything that doesn't fit the narrative from existence.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Personally, I don't think removing search results entirely is the way to do it, as that feels like censorship. I prefer Facebook's solution where they put (or have said they're going to at least) a warning above the article saying it's a questionable source, but still allow you to see it.

And who the fuck watches the watchmen?

Literally all the organizations doing the fact checking are left wing with terrible track records, plagued with scandals and overtly biased

So no that's not good either.

 

[ADHD]

Google has never needed a competitor as a search engine more than now.

https://www.bing.com/

Isn't that the only other real option? AOL and Yahoo search are both "powered by Bing" so they're not really alternatives.

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

https://www.bing.com/

Best porn search engine EVER

 

[OwO What's This?]

Best porn search engine EVER

http://www.pornmd.com/

 

[Takayuki Yagami]

There is indeed a crusade going on inside large tech companies against fake news stories, usually not entirely backed by the executives (for necessary PR reasons), but set in motion by the engineers themselves. A lot of engineers feel they're responsible for the spread of fake news because the tools they created enable it, and push hard inside large tech companies to be allowed to do more to counter it. What you're seeing here is likely a result of that internal push happening at Google.

Personally, I don't think removing search results entirely is the way to do it, as that feels like censorship. I prefer Facebook's solution where they put (or have said they're going to at least) a warning above the article saying it's a questionable source, but still allow you to see it.

Feals like? It is. Keeping stupid people from being heard, and ridiculed, is not their place and whoever approved this should not be there anymore.

 

[r00]

Why dont they start censoring sites about religion, seeing as holocaust denial is about as grounded in reality as believing any of the shit that happened in the bible? Fuck this nonsense. Most people are smart enough to know that holocaust denial is retarded, why would google pander to the few loons that are crazy enough to believe it?

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

Fells like? It is. Stopping stupid people from being heard, and ridiculed, is not their place and whoever approved this should not be there anymore.

Which is precisely why I prefer Facebook's solution. I don't think it's a tech company's place to stop you from seeing something, but there are some people out there who really are stupid enough to believe the most ridiculous, obviously fake things that get shared to their wall. These are the gullible people I believe should be given a warning. They're vulnerable and need a little help.

And I'm not talking about things that are simply might be biased or controversial (though those will probably be flagged as well), I mean shit like "Obama is a reptile alien who literally founded ISIS"-type garbage.

You should, of course, also be able to disable these warnings if you want.

 

[CatParty]

And I'm not talking about things that are simply might be biased or controversial (though those will probably be flagged as well)

oh totally. i mean we can all agree holocaust deniers are straight up retarded but how far will this go? are the farms and ED next because they have satire?

 

[Cuck Norris]

oh totally. i mean we can all agree holocaust deniers are straight up exceptional but how far will this go? are the farms and ED next because they have satire?

They already got 8chan. But I think that had to do with pedo shit.

 

[John Furrman]

I don't think it's a tech company's place to stop you from seeing something, but there are some people out there who really are stupid enough to believe the most ridiculous, obviously fake things that get shared to their wall. These are the gullible people I believe should be given a warning. They're vulnerable and need a little help.

Companies have obligations to their consumers to limit the externalities that come from their economic operations. Google's product is blatantly misinforming people because some people figured out how to game the system for shits and giggles. It is their obligation to their company mission to contain those externalities since Google is synonymous with internet search engine and that's a big responsibility. There is no playbook for this level of misinformation and mistakes are going to be made while correcting it. However the worst thing to do would let things remain unchanged. Change is how a company learns from its mistakes.

Personally, I don't think removing search results entirely is the way to do it, as that feels like censorship.

It was never Google's mission to be a bastion of free speech.

This is their mission statement:
Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.

fake news Propaganda is not useful, which is against their mission statement, so it is absolutely within their duty as an organization to correct it. It's not information when it's obviously meant to misinform.

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

Companies have obligations to their consumers to limit the externalities that come from their economic operations. Google's product is blatantly misinforming people because some people figured out how to game the system for shits and giggles.

Precisely, which is why I think flagging something as questionable is an acceptable medium between censorship and letting malevolent actors run rampant.