[Updated] YouTube users increasingly concerned with adult comments (sex bots) spamming replies on videos

New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….

Original story (published on October 18, 2021) follows:

YouTube is the most popular video-sharing and social media platform launched back in 2005 and is now owned by Google.

It is one of the busiest media platforms with more than a billion monthly users. People on this platform also consume over a billion hours of content on a daily basis.

Anyone can become a creator on YouTube and upload videos keeping its guidelines into consideration. With such a vast user base, YouTube also opens up to activities such as spamming which ruins the overall experience.

As per reports (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), many users are concerned with the increasing number of adult comments on videos that are posted by sex bots. Users are complaining that NSFW bot profiles are popping up all over the replies.

Its not people , its actual bots , they use AI. They copy comments from similar comments and videos and paste them underneath your comment. (Source)

These are on all of my comments now. They copy the most popular comments on the video and paste them as comments on comments. The spam message is in the username. Presumably, the spam detection system mostly cares about the content of the comment.

I’ve been reporting then as sexually explicit, but YouTube probably needs to learn to detect them automatically to have any impact. (Source)

These bots appear with NSFW names and profile pictures that are not suited for children and it can have a bad impression. However, the comments made using these profiles are not NSFW but just spam.

Actually, these bots use AI and copy comments from similar videos and paste them underneath user comments as a reply. This activity is now increasing day by day which seriously needs to diminish.

The profile picture used by these bots is considered pornographic content which should not appear as many users on YouTube are below 18 years.

Due to vast content and users, YouTube has automated many things such as copyrighting and auto-deleting channels with inappropriate content, and yet bots are left free to comment anywhere.

Meanwhile, YouTube has not said anything on this matter as to why it is happening and when it will be sorted out.

These spamming activities should not happen on such a big platform and it is something that needs to be sorted out as soon as possible.

While we wait for YouTube’s reply over this, you can share your thoughts on this whole situation in the comments below. Moreover, we will keep you updated on the further development of this story.

10:00 am (IST): YouTube is finally doing something about comments spamming. The company is testing a content moderation tool that YouTubers can use to hold potentially inappropriate comments for review.

11:31 am (IST): YouTube has announced that it will disable hidden subscribers count on YouTube channels to reduce comment spamming. This change will take effect from July 29.

The company is also restricting the use of special characters in the channel’s name as using many special characters is considered as a common spam tactic.

12:53 pm (IST): YouTube is finally taking care of the comment spamming with better spam detection and banning suspicious accounts for 24 hours. More on that here.

Note: We have a dedicated issues/bugs and pending improvements tracker for YouTube, so make sure to follow that as well.

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