Google has collaborated with authoritarian regimes globally, including Russia’s Kremlin and the Chinese Communist Party, to accommodate censorship requests, as revealed by an Observer investigation. Since 2011, the tech giant has interacted with the governments of approximately 150 countries seeking to erase information from public view. This includes not only democratic nations but also dictatorships, sanctioned governments, and those accused of human rights violations, such as the police in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
In response to requests from the Russian and Chinese governments, Google has removed content like YouTube videos featuring anti-state protests and material that criticizes or alleges corruption among their officials. According to Google’s own data, there are 5.6 million items of content it has “named for removal” following government requests. Requests for content removal have more than doubled globally since 2020, as reported by cybersecurity firm Surfshark.
As one of the most influential information gatekeepers worldwide, Google’s products, including Search, YouTube, Drive, and Chrome, are used by billions daily. The company frequently receives requests to remove information from various national and local governments, as well as from judicial, police, and military entities. Content can be removed for various reasons, including copyright infringement, privacy violations, defamation, or breaches of company policies.
While Google does not disclose comprehensive data on takedown requests, it does provide selected summaries of certain censorship requests deemed “of public interest” in its Transparency Report, updated biannually. An analysis by the Observer of this report has uncovered a lack of clarity in the content removal process and incomplete data, raising concerns about Google’s influence over public information, particularly regarding disinformation, war propaganda, and geopolitical issues. Critics argue that Google is “playing God” with minimal oversight or regulation.
The Observer’s analysis of removal data for specific countries, the nature of requests, and the entities making them has shown that since 2020, the majority of global takedown requests to Google are based on national security, copyright, and privacy concerns. Thousands of requests fall under the category of “other,” with no further explanation from Google. A single removal request can pertain to multiple content items. Google, whose parent company Alphabet reported revenues of $350 billion last year, provides figures for the total items it has “named for removal” but does not clarify how many have actually been removed. Notably, in the four years leading up to June 2024, Russia accounted for over 60% of takedown requests.
