Arkansas A.G. Demands Answers on YouTube Censorship

Big Tech,

Last week, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin joined 15 other state attorneys general in a letter demanding that executives at Google and YouTube explain YouTube’s decision to censor conservative content.

The letter says that last September, YouTube’s parent company, Alphabet, Inc., publicly admitted that Senior Biden Administration officials “conducted repeated and sustained outreach to Alphabet and pressed the Company regarding certain user-generated content related to the COVID-19 pandemic that did not violate its policies.”

The letter also notes that YouTube removed video footage of gatherings and events posted by conservative organizations.

To ensure YouTube is complying with consumer protection laws, the letter asks YouTube’s executives a series of questions about how the platform reviews, moderates, and flags video content, and it requests documents showing how YouTube treated conservative video channels like The Daily Wire and CPAC.

Unfortunately, we have seen tech companies and other corporations censor conservatives on their platforms in recent years — and sometimes it seems like our own government is the one pushing the censorship.

In 2024, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg wrote a letter to the U.S. House Judiciary Committee saying the Biden Administration “pressured” his teams to censor content related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

And congressional testimony and news stories have highlighted how federal officials allegedly pressured financial institutions to cancel bank accounts and suspend financial services for conservative organizations.

We deeply appreciate Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin joining with his colleagues in holding tech companies accountable.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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AI Tech Giants Enabled Digital Exploitation of Women and Children: Report

Big Tech,

Recent news stories allege tech companies like X, Apple, Google have profited from apps that let users digitally undress women and children without their consent.

A report from the Tech Transparency Project reveals that tech giants have hosted dozens of AI-powered “nudify” applications on their app stores, despite having policies that supposedly prohibit such content.

These apps use artificial intelligence to create deepfake nude images of real people, including minors. The apps have reportedly been downloaded more than 705 million times worldwide.

This technology represents a new form of sexual exploitation that lawmakers and parents are struggling to address. The apps essentially let anyone with a smartphone sexually victimize others. And despite repeated warnings from pro-family groups and others, tech companies have been slow to remove these applications.

Arkansas families need to understand this threat. Last year, Arkansas’ lawmakers passed Act 827 by Rep. Stephen Meeks (R — Greenbrier) and Sen. Clint Penzo (R — Springdale) to prohibit people from using artificial intelligence to create and distribute deepfake pornographic images depicting another individual without that individual’s consent. The law also lets the Arkansas Attorney General take legal action against the developers responsible for this kind of technology. It’s a good law that helps address this problem — but it’s possible Arkansas will need to do more as artificial intelligence continues to expand.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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We Got Our Facebook Ads Account Back

Big Tech, ,

Back about a month ago Facebook disabled our advertising account without warning and with virtually no explanation. After appealing that decision, we got our advertising account back — again with virtually no explanation.

Family Council is authorized to run political ads on Facebook. From time to time we use our Facebook ad account to boost the stories and videos that we share on social media to make sure that people see them. We’ve never had trouble before with Facebook refusing to approve our ads.

On November 2, Facebook sent us a terse message abruptly disabling our ad account. We requested a review of that decision.

After a few days, Facebook sent us another terse email saying our advertising account had been reinstated.

We asked Facebook for an explanation outlining why our account had been disabled in the first place. But we never received any more information. To this day, we aren’t sure what we did that Facebook felt ran afoul of their advertising standards. We cannot find anything on our Facebook page that violates the social media giant’s policies.

Coincidentally, Facebook’s decision to disable our ad account came shortly after we submitted a request to advertise one of our recent videos about the lawsuit against the Jonesboro Public Library. Nothing in that video violates Facebook’s policy, but it’s the only post we had tried to advertise recently.

For now, though, Family Council’s Facebook advertising account is back online.

All of this underscores two things:

First, that tech companies seem to have virtually no accountability when it comes to suppressing or throttling free speech.

And second, that conservatives should not depend on social media for news and information.

That’s why we encourage all of our friends and supporters to join our traditional mailing list. We’ll send you regular update letters filled with information about current events in Arkansas.

If you aren’t on our regular mailing list, click here, and we will add you to the list today. Our update letters are completely free; we never charge for them.

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