New Delhi, Jan 12: The PIB Fact Check Unit (FCU) of the
Ministry of Information & Broadcasting busted six
YouTube channels, which were working in a coordinated
manner and spreading false information in India.
The Fact Check Unit released six separate Twitter threads
having over 100 fact-checks to counter the fake news
spread by these channels. This is the second such action
from the Unit under the Ministry of Information and
Broadcasting where entire channels have been busted, an
official statement said.
According to the release, six YouTube channels were
found to be operating as part of a coordinated
disinformation network, had nearly 20 lakh subscribers
and their videos have been marked watched over 51 crore
times.
The YouTube channels exposed by the PIB Fact Check
unit spread fake news about the elections, proceedings in
the Supreme Court and Parliament of India, functioning of
the Government of India, etc. Examples include false
claims regarding ban on Electronic Voting Machines, and
false statements attributed to senior Constitutional
functionaries including the President of India, Chief Justice
of India.
The channels are part of a fake news economy that thrives
on monetization of fake news. The channels use fake,
clickbait and sensational thumbnails and images of
television news anchors of TV Channels to mislead the
viewers to believe that the news was authentic and drive
traffic to their channels in order to monetize the videos
published by them.
This is the second such action by the PIB Fact Check Unit.
In an earlier major action, on 20th December, 2022, the
Unit had exposed three channels peddling fake news.
