The FTC led by Chairman Andrew Ferguson is using the authority of its consumer protection bureau, led by Chris Mufarrige, to investigate and potentially sue Google’s YouTube for deceptive claims about its censorship policies.
Bloomberg reports that the FTC has been investigating whether Google’s YouTube violated consumer protection laws when it suspended the accounts of users, according to people familiar with the probe.
The antitrust and consumer protection agency has been probing YouTube since last year and is in the final stages of preparing a potential lawsuit, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing a confidential probe.
The inquiry is looking at whether YouTube violated its own user policies when it banned or demoted content, said the people. The investigation is scrutinizing whether users may have been deceived by the company’s content policies into signing up for the service by believing they were allowed to post certain content, only to later have it taken down or have their accounts suspended, according to the people.
This isn’t just about vague guidelines. The FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, led by Chris Mufarrige, is digging into specific cases where YouTube allegedly pulled the plug on accounts without clear violations. Political figures like President Donald Trump (whose account was suspended after January 6) and health content creators have found themselves in YouTube’s crosshairs before.
FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson put it bluntly: “Whatever your policies are, you have to follow them.” The agency has received 3,000 public complaints about inconsistent moderation, suggesting this isn’t a niche concern.
Within a month of taking office as Chair, Ferguson issued an inquiry into tech censorship.
“Tech firms should not be bullying their users,” said FTC Chairman Ferguson. “This inquiry will help the FTC better understand how these firms may have violated the law by silencing and intimidating Americans for speaking their minds.”
Big Tech censorship is not just un-American, it is potentially illegal. The FTC wants the help of Americans to investigate these potential violations of the law. The agency is asking for public submissions from anyone who has been a victim of tech censorship (banning, demonetization, shadow banning, etc.), from employees of tech platforms, or from anyone else who can shed light on these practices and the ways in which they may violate the law.
Chris Mufarrige who is leading the consumer protection division has been taking a leadership role in fighting censorship. In interview with the Guardian, Mufarrige stated:
Their argument around misinformation and other ‘free speech’ issues has always been ‘we’re merely the platform’.
When it comes to advertising, which is what we’re talking about here, the question for the social media companies and the search engines becomes: what is their role in the advertising that you’re seeing?
This is not just simply a situation where you and I are on Facebook and you’re telling me that I’m ugly. This is a situation where a car dealership is putting an advertisement on the platform, and the platform’s interacting with the dealer. So it’s a different dynamic that we’re talking about. And the consumer is suffering some sort of measurable harm.
Breitbart News previously reported that in addition to going after Censorship the Consumer Protection Bureau has taken leadership in going after WPATH:
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and several Republican-led states filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), alleging that the organization has “made false, misleading, or unsubstantiated statements” to promote sex-mutilating drugs and surgeries for minors for the benefit of its members.
“Today, the FTC filed a lawsuit against WPATH alleging that the organization made false and unsubstantiated claims regarding the necessity, effectiveness and safety of puberty blockers, hormones and sex-change surgeries,” FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson said in a statement.
This is marked improvement over the previous Trump FTC Chair Joe Simons, who rejected attempts to use consumer protection against Big Tech censorship, telling Ted Cruz: ““It is not clear to me that the FTC should be addressing that at all,”
Cruz retorted: “ […] I would also encourage the Commission when you say that you don’t think you have the authority to address these issues, you do have extensive consumer protection authority and when tech companies are holding themselves out to the public and customers as neutral public forums, and are actively engaged in hidden censorship, that is actively deceptive.”
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of AI, free speech, and online censorship.