Google, The Innocence of Muslims, and the politics of tech

Google turned 14 today and, like most teenagers, it’s starting to realise that it can’t simply ignore politics. As an Electoral Commission advert put it: everything is political. Now Google is finding it cannot just call itself a "platform" and avoid all the uncomfortable questions.

In the US, its growing lobbying efforts are paying dividends. Only this week, California joined Nevada in legalising the use of Google’s self-driving cars on its roads, the result of a lot of cash spent on lobbyists. But beyond its American homeland, political problems are multiplying for the internet giant.

In Brazil, vital to its South American expansion strategy, Google has been hit with a landslide of legal cases over YouTube. Yesterday, its head of operations in the country, Fabio Jose Silva Coelho, was arrested after the company declined to remove clips involving a mayoral candidate and similar cases continue throughout Brazil. Another Google executive who refused to censor videos only escaped jail thanks to the ruling of a higher court.

The company’s problems in Brazil seem minor, though, when compared to the furore over The Innocence of Muslims. The clip, used as a catalyst for demonstrations across the world and violent attacks on US diplomatic posts, remains hosted on YouTube despite requests from the White House for its removal and lawsuits from actors duped into appearing in the movie.

Google says The Innocence of Muslims – which was uploaded in July 2012 and has had at least three other titles – does not breach YouTube guidelines. However, it has blocked users from seeing the video in India, Indonesia, Libya and Egypt due to local laws and “the sensitive situation”. Despite Google’s consistent claims that YouTube is a "platform”, that policy is political. It stands against censorship only when its commercial interests will not be damaged.

Google is by no means the only tech firm striking an apolitical pose while making clearly political choices. Last month, Apple rejected Drones+, an app that tells users whenever a US drone kills in a strike in Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia. The app does not feature gruesome images and relies on a publicly available database compiled by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Still, Apple has repeatedly denied it a place in its App Store.

Online stores like Apple’s are not apolitical: they draw lines between what is and isn’t offensive and reflect the culture of the organisations that create them. While it has approved apps including Jiggle HD – for animating breasts in photos – and the ABC of Boobs, Apple deemed Drones+ to be “not useful”. A later rejection dismissed the content as “objectionable”.

The death toll from drones is objectionable, but it’s happening and by denying Drones+ entry into its store Apple is acting to suppress the spread of that information. If talking about deaths in war zones is “content that many audiences would find objectionable”, Apple should start pulling down every news app in the store.

California, the home of both Apple and Google, may have a political climate that’s a mix of laissez-faire capitalism and hippy posturing, but the companies’ products and services ship globally. Apple has always had a touch of the totalitarian about it when governing its App Store, and as Google expands in nations that don't respect press freedom, its unofficial “don’t be evil” mantra seems more and more naive.

William Gibson famously said: “The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.” If freedom of speech and expression hold the key to our future, the internet and the firms that make so much money from it must do more to spread those ideals evenly.