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Tell HN: Google removes Russian news from results

57 points by supergirl ↗ HN
Searching for "Russia Today" or "Sputnik News" doesn't return their URLs, but does return other related links. Seems to be related to a gov request: https://lumendatabase.org/notices/26927483#.

It's not a court order, so Google voluntarily decided to implement this.

Mildly interesting; I don't think anyone is surprised.

35 comments

[ 0.23 ms ] story [ 87.7 ms ] thread
mmarq
These outlets have been sanctioned by, at least, the EU. I think it’s safer to block them everywhere.

Said that, they are part of the propaganda machine of a criminal regime, something akin to Der Stürmer. As far as I’m concerned, they shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

auxfil
enjoy living in your brave new world
nxm
There’ll be a day when you’re labeled a member of another criminal regime. That’s how it ends. Is Google the ultimate judge of good and bad now?
jstx1
They aren't claiming to be the ultimate judge of anything; they can decide what results to serve and what results not to serve and they've been doing this since they started Google Search.
moralestapia
Do not try to be obtuse, the issue is not whether they claim that or not, it's about their actions regarding content on their platform.
nojito
No. This is from sanctions.
jstx1
That was exactly my point to the grandparent comment, I don’t get why you’re repeating it like it’s some kind of rebuttal.
moralestapia
Cringe.

I'll explain.

>They aren't claiming to be the ultimate judge of anything

is a moot point, it doesn't go forward with the discussion, nor is in line with the intent of GPs comment. I kindly ask you not to be obtuse and you just take it further, wow, some people ...

jyu
Imagine if instead of facing a judge and jury, you just get labeled as a dissident by one of Google's legally infallible black box AI filters. No longer can you use Email, Maps, News, Video, or any of the internet using Analytics. No person to talk to for trying to appeal the AI ruling.
lozenge
"I think it’s safer to block them everywhere."

Does that apply to all EU legal and extralegal decisions to block information?

It would be funny if prominent US figures started using GDPR "right to be forgotten" to remove search results...

mmarq
I mean that if I managed a news app and the EU sanctions forced me to remove RT from the results served in the EU, it would be easier and safer for remove them for everybody. Otherwise I’d risk to violate said sanctions.
guidovranken
Read the books they want to ban. Thanks for the heads up.
iExploder
and in another news... russia removes european news, because thats propaganda

you see, propaganda is only good when its OUR propaganda, and freedom of speech is only freedom when what you are speaking aligns with our values...

you can have a discussion about anything as long as both sides fundamentally agree with the mainstream narrative

rvz
Unsurprising.

I’m just writing down all the nasty things that these private platforms can do when you cross the line somehow whenever they want.

onedognight
There are literally millions of web sites Google won’t index and not indexing this one makes them nasty? Bombing civilians and nuclear plants is nasty. Not making a copy of a web page? Not nasty. Google. has employees in Ukraine and Russia. Now one set is running for their lives and the other is hard to pay.
rvz
What's nasty is that Google can do this to ANY news site (and they have), even if the other side covers parts of the whole story which was missed by the mainstream media and they will avoid and will not cover it because it doesn't fit their narrative.

> Bombing civilians and nuclear plants is nasty. Not making a copy of a web page? Not nasty.

It's also nasty to spread and amplify misleading propaganda on either side isn't it? It's a two-way street and this action amplifies it more on the other side; causing the misinformation and the nasty actions you see online. It's reactionary and completely nasty.

> Now one set is running for their lives and the other is hard to pay.

And both sides will get targeted and filtered propaganda to get themselves into a situation like this.

That is just one of thousands of things Google can do voluntarily to so called excuse of to 'stop the spread of misinformation' as it has surely has done a great job at doing so with YouTube didn't it?

Tenoke
>Mildly interesting; I don't think anyone is surprised.

I am surprised. I didn't expect to be Great Firewall'd without fanfare as an European and I haven't seen Google Search be quite that heavy handed before.

I also get a message that I can't access RT's Twitter from Germany nor can I search what they are saying in Russia directly in any of the usual places.

esperent
> Great Firewall'd

Hyperbole much?

CRConrad
> Great Firewall'd

Great Firewalled. If someone builds a wall around you, you're walled in -- not "wall'd in".

markus_zhang
If other search engines start to do similar things, it's going to be really dangerous for democracy.
bjourne
A censorship resistant search engine in sorely needed.
ComradePhil
I have said it before[1][2] and I will say it again:

The Chinese model of online information management has been extremely successful and there is no reason for other rulers to not try to copy it.

India has it in place[3], Russia is trying to do it [4]... and the west has been doing it too and it is done by making it seem like people have free choice of posting infromation but having tech companies remove, hide, shadow-ban, or otherwise limit the spread of information dangerous to the rulers.

This is inevitable and there are no other options.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30510857

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30492226

[3] https://advox.globalvoices.org/2020/02/10/what-do-we-know-ab...

[4] https://www.economist.com/business/russia-is-trying-to-build...

someonehere
Trying to pretend there isn’t one world power at work here is kinda making the conspiracy theorists sound reasonable.
[deleted]
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kderbyma
I want of freedom of speech ... this is how Google makes us dumb....and bugs up all the good deals...

it's COVID all over again. far news from the trusted sources.

gotohater
I understand the point of freedom of speech, but isn't it going a bit too far with the conspiracy theories?
onedognight
Google doesn’t control speech. You can go to RT’s site directly. It’s not blocked. However Twitter and FaceBook are blocked in Russia. The actual sites. Hmm.
gt565k
The case for a decentralized Web 3.0 grows by the minute.
Jxl180
How does Web 3.0 attempt to solve for this?
gt565k
Decentralized, meaning can't be controlled by a single government or entity.
Jxl180
You didn’t describe what is being decentralized in this case.
jrwan
I search “rt” and the first link Google returns is www.rt.com.
jrwan
Just checked the the government request, probably this is just US/Europe thing?