Weekly Digest: Russian propaganda on YouTube and Twitter, UK’s push to collect online creators’ taxes

It’s been a year since Western governments and tech platforms cracked down on Russian propaganda outlets following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. However, in some cases Russian (pro-)government propagandists are still able to break through.

A report published this week by Newsguard shows that documentaries spreading falsehoods about Ukraine and the war produced by the RT, Russian state propaganda outlet broadcasting abroad, are still spreading on YouTube despite the ban.

The study found “more than 250 uploads of RT’s documentaries [produced by the RT at the rate of approximately once per week] about the war in Ukraine across more than 100 YouTube channels, with over a half-million views combined” in English and Russian, sometimes also available in Spanish and French.

As Newsguard notes, RT’s chief editor Margarita Simonyan has spoken publicly about the broadcaster’s tactic of spreading their videos on YouTube without RT branding. The platform’s moderation system eventually finds and removes the videos, but not before they get millions of views, Simonyan has boasted. 

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Another report shows that Russian propagandists are using the updated verification system on Twitter, which now allows everyone to purchase a blue check following Elon Musk’s acquisition of the platform. 

According to findings by the research group Reset reported by The Washington Post, even though the accounts claim to be based outside Russia so as to circumvent the sanctions, “they pass along articles from state-run media, statements by Russian officials, and lies about Ukraine from Kremlin allies”.

The platform’s new owner not only implemented the system that allows users to buy Twitter verification, but he himself “has boosted one of the accounts by replying to its tweets, including one spreading a lie that thousands of NATO troops had died in Ukraine”, The Washington Post notes. 

(On a related note, this week the BBC included incorrect information in a news story based on a tweet from a parody Twitter account with purchased verification. While the mistake itself was largely innocuous, this case arguably shows that journalists and other Twitter users haven’t fully let go of the muscle memory prompting them to trust blue-checked accounts).

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HM Revenue & Customs, the UK’s government tax agency, sent a letter to thousands of online creators reminding them to pay taxes over the revenue they bring, such as brand deals and payments from the platforms like YouTube and Instagram.

Although online content creation has rapidly expanded in recent years, “experts say awareness of the tax due from many people earning money from their online content is low, particularly among those in their teens and twenties”, The Financial Times reports. In other words, many creators simply don’t think about taxes, and even those who do might not know all aspects of the system, such as the need to pay taxes on free products provided by businesses for promotion.

However, as the creator economy is growing and the governments are catching up, social media influences and other online creators are increasingly becoming a part of the regular economy.

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