A video falsely claimed that the government was distributing money among Aadhaar card holders
New Delhi:
Three YouTube channels with a total of 33 lakh subscribers have been busted for spreading fake news about Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and key institutions, the centre said today.
The YouTube channels are News Headlines, Sarkari Update and Aaj Tak Live.
A government statement said that the probe against these three channels was conducted by the fact-check unit of Press Information Bureau, the government’s nodal agency to disseminate information.
YouTube channel “आज तक LIVE” is another den of #FakeNews. With over 65,000 subscribers, the YouTube channel spreads false claims about the death of various persons and misinformation about Government decisions. Here’s a thread by @PIBFactCheck busting some of its claims🔽 pic.twitter.com/91fyeToq5h
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) December 20, 2022
The unit conducted a series of over 40 fact-checks and found several videos spreading misinformation about the Prime Minister, the Chief Justice, the Supreme Court, the Election Commission and the EVM voting system. These videos, the government said, had been watched over 30 crore times.
A YouTube channel ‘SarkariUpdate’ with over 2.26M subscribers found to be propagating #FakeNews about various schemes of the Government of India. @PIBFactCheck found almost all of its content to be fake. Here’s a thread⬇️ pic.twitter.com/yg309uwRq2
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) December 20, 2022
The examples of misinformation shared on the channels included fake news items claiming that future polls would be held through a ballot system. Another video claimed that the government was distributing money among anyone who holds a bank account or an Aadhaar card.
A #YouTube channel ‘News Headlines’ with almost 10 lakh subscribers and 32 crore views has been found to be propagating #FakeNews about the Prime Minister, Supreme Court of India, Chief Justice of India, and the Election Commission of India pic.twitter.com/9qUR7xqBd9
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) December 20, 2022
These YouTube channels, the probe found, were using logos of TV channels and images of prominent news anchors to mislead the viewers into believing that the news was authentic. “These channels were also found to be displaying advertisements on their videos, and monetizing misinformation on YouTube,” the PIB statement said.
The PIB added that more than one hundred YouTube channels have been blocked by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting over the past one year as part of its crackdown on misinformation.
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