AT&T Inc. has once again pulled its advertising from YouTube, after growing concerns about the media streaming platform’s questionable content, which includes possible exploitation of children.
Up until a month ago, AT&T had been boycotting the platform for nearly two years, due to concerns related to videos that feature “hate speech or other disturbing material.” And now, just a month later, it appears to be planning to resume its boycott.
In a statement released on Thursday, a spokesman from AT&T said, “Until Google can protect our brand from offensive content of any kind, we are removing all advertising from YouTube.”
The “offensive content” is referring to alleged child exploitation videos that one magazine reported to have been showing advertisements from the telecommunications company.
Another company, food and beverage maker Nestle, paused all of its YouTube advertising after Wired’s magazine article stating that Nestle commercials had been running on videos with offensive content and comment sections.
YouTube claimed to have already removed some of the content which violated its policies, as well as disabled comments on videos that contained instances of minors. It also added in a statement, “There’s more to be done, and we continue to work to improve and catch abuse more quickly.”
