Top Google exec says YouTube safety issue affected 'very small' number of ads as video giant welcomes third-party auditing
Google’s chief business officer Philipp Schindler has said that YouTube's engineers have developed improved software to track potentially unsafe content in the aftermath of concerns around brand safety on the platform.
Top Google exec says YouTube safety issue affected 'very small' number of ads and that video giant has upped response time
Speaking in an interview with Recode, the executive was careful not to play down the issue, but underscored the low number of companies affected, saying it has always been a "small" problem with "very, very, very small numbers" of ads running adjacent to content deemed unsafe for brands.
"If you look at it from an advertiser perspective, the error rates we’re talking about — I’m careful in saying this, because I don’t want to take away from the importance of the problem, and that we need to get it right — but the numbers are tiny, tiny," he added.
His comments come amid a fallout from a Times investigation that found big-name advertisers were inadvertently funding terrorism via ad placements, and follow on from Google’s European boss Matt Brittin saying the issue had been "a handful of impressions" and a case of "pennies and not pounds".
Google has now moved to combat the problem, announcing a three-prong strategy to assuage brands; an approach which came only after the likes of Marks & Spencer, the Guardian and the UK government froze spend with the platform.
Schindler says improved technology is now able to track down five times more videos deemed inappropriate for advertisers, adding that YouTube has also upped its response time when a user flags content.
He said that third-party verification from companies DoubleVerify and comScore will come in the form of audits to ensure Google is maintaining efforts to keep ads away from unsuitable clips.
Google later clarified that this verification system is built on machine learning which will identify content that may be objectionable to advertisers. It also claimed to have brought in a new rapid response path, reducing the review time for flagged videos to just a few hours.
A Google spokesperson said: "As part of our commitment to provide even more transparency and visibility to our advertising partners, we’ll be working with trusted vendors to provide 3rd party brand safety reporting on YouTube. We are working with companies that are MRC-accredited for ad verification on this initiative and will begin integrating these technologies shortly."
Earlier today (3 April), an alliance of regional UK publishers including Johnston Press, Newsquest and DC Thompson published an open letter looking to persuade ad agencies and brands to switch their spend to local media in the wake of the furore around Google and YouTube.