Google accused of ‘monetising’ website linked to Southport misinformation

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Get our free View from Westminster email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Committee chair Chi Onwurah MP, during an evidence session on misinformation, said MPs had seen a report from digital advertising watchdog Check My Ads, which said it had evidence that a website claimed “to be monetised” by two firms, including Google, “at the time that it published that misinformation”. In response, Google’s managing director for trust and safety in Europe, Amanda Storey, said that if true, such an incident would violate the tech giant’s rules and it would investigate “what had gone wrong”. “These fast-moving, real-world situations are very challenging – there is viral spread of misinformation on social media, and we have to deal with the echo of that across sites that we operate with.” Elsewhere in the session, Ms Storey said she believed that had the Online Safety Act been in effect last summer when the riots took place, it would have “made a difference” to how easily misinformation was able to spread. “I think that our policies and our approaches meant that we were not particularly implicated in what happened in the Southport situation, but obviously it’s an atrocious attack, and our thoughts and sympathies are with the families.” But in response, committee member Emily Darlington MP said she was “concerned” that Google appeared to be trying to distance itself from links to misinformation around the Southport attack.