Google and YouTube on Thursday announced a new policy that prohibits climate deniers from being able to monetize their content on its platforms via ads or creator payments. Why it matters: It's one of the most aggressive measures any major tech platform has taken to combat climate change misinformation. Google advertisers and publishers, as well as YouTube creators, will be prohibited from making ad revenue off content that contradicts "Well-established scientific consensus around the existence and causes of climate change," the company's ads team said in a statement.

"This includes content referring to climate change as a hoax or a scam, claims denying that long-term trends show the global climate is warming, and claims denying that greenhouse gas emissions or human activity contribute to climate change." Ads and monetization will still be allowed to run alongside other climate-related topics, like public debates on climate policy, impacts of climate change, and new research around the issue. Google said it's making these changes in response to frustration from advertisers and content creators about their messages appearing alongside climate denialism.

Yes, but: Google often makes changes to its ads policies to reduce misinformation, but this update is notable, given how hard it can be to characterize certain commentary about climate change as denialism or misinformation. The tech giant says that when evaluating content against the new policy, "We'll look carefully at the context in which claims are made, differentiating between content that states a false claim as fact, versus content that reports on or discusses that claim." The company says it has consulted with experts, like representatives of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports, to create the policy. The big picture: Internet companies have been under increased pressure from climate activists to do more to address climate change denial on their platforms.

Source : Axios