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> You can't tell me that they're too difficult to distinguish from legitimate content. Any human being or half-decent algorithm would be able to catch these wit

by jsnell 5y ago

> You can't tell me that they're too difficult to distinguish from legitimate content. Any human being or half-decent algorithm would be able to catch these with no trouble at all (heck, I could write a couple of regular expressions that would do the trick and have 0 false positives), Of course I can tell you that! :) Abuse is an adversarial and dynamic problem. A simple regex will never solve the problem for more than a very short time period. Sometimes such short term fixes are called for, since they'll buy you the time for something more principled. But they cannot be the solution forever, because the abusers will adapt. The more different variants you end up blocking, the more likely it is that they somehow interact and produce serious FPs. And then you've got a PR mess on your hands with people complaining about how "Jeff Bezos is being censored by YouTube". Abuse is pretty thankless that way: nobody ever sees your successes, only your failures, and it's all a job of balancing the two. What you actually want for fighting bulk spam (rather than other forms of abuse) is robust signals that are broadly useful rather than specific to one campaign. As for your actual question, I haven't actually been seeing this in my recommendations (but then again, I don't have anything related to cryptocurrency or Elon Musk in my recommendations). Maybe this isn't actually as widespread a problem as you're suggesting? To put it bluntly, perhaps cryptocurrency is an area where the legit content is basically indistinguishable from scams.

SilverRed 5y ago
We may as well think of the spammers as their own ML whos aim and weighting is to fool the spam prevention. So as good as you make the spam AI, the spammer AI evolves to be better than it since they keep iterating until they find whatever formula does not trip the spam protection. >Any human being or half-decent algorithm would be able to catch these with no trouble at all And this statement from OP is blatantly false because if it was true, no human would fall for the scams. But they do fall for them, in huge volumes. Especially if the scams appear to come from a known authority like Elon, the police, your boss, etc. And if you did find a half decent algorithm that worked, the spammers would just iterate again to make spam that doesn't trip it.
- curiousgeorgio 5y ago
  > And if you did find a half decent algorithm that worked, the spammers would just iterate again to make spam that doesn't trip it. So, the solution is not to even try? How has that worked out for other platforms?
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    Is it a major problem? The scams seem super obvious, and if you subscribe to more content you’re interested in I guess they’d go away. Are they really causing you a problem?
    - curiousgeorgio 5y ago
      I don't subscribe to any channels. Up until this point, their recommendation algorithm has been great, and I'd love for it to stay that way. Major problem? No. Increasing annoyance? Absolutely. > The scams seem super obvious Exactly. That's why I can't fathom why YT keeps letting them through.
      - chrisseaton 5y ago
        > I don't subscribe to any channels. Well that’s definitely where you’re going wrong! Subscribing is a strong signal to the algorithm. It’s having to guess otherwise. And at the moment I guess you’re feeding the algorithm with a stream of engagement with all these videos you’re linking to, digging yourself deeper! Stop engaging with them, and subscribe to content you like instead. I never get any videos even remotely like this in my feed - I get videos related to things I subscribe to. You need to give the system some quality input. It isn’t magic. Garbage in garbage out.
        curiousgeorgio 5y ago
        Nope - I'm not going to start subscribing to channels. Their algorithm has plenty to work with based on my watch history and my spam reports (I've reported every single one of these scams I've come across, usually directly from the recommendations page - not even clicking to watch the video itself). I'm interested in such a wide range of topics that I prefer recommendations based on individual videos I've watched rather than specific creators/channels. I'm glad you don't get these in your feed, but based on others in this thread, it sounds like I'm not that unique in experiencing the issue.
curiousgeorgio 5y ago
Yes, I understand that a regex isn't a long-term solution, but if you've actually seen any of these pop up on YouTube (they're on the front page of my recommendations right now; I've seen probably 30 just today), you'll know what I'm talking about. These are what I'd call "low-hanging fruit" spam – extremely easily distinguished from real content. After months of it happening (and I've seen literally hundreds of the exact same type of video recommended to me), a simple solution would undoubtedly be effective, or at least better than nothing. Get a single intern to double-check the ones that your algorithm identifies to avoid FPs. If the scammers get more sophisticated, cross that bridge when you get to it. But solve the immediate, easy issues now. It's seriously not that hard. This isn't the kind of difficult ML-generated spam that you're probably thinking of, and I agree - at that point it does become a game of cat and mouse. At that point, I'd be understanding when it sneaks through the cracks. I've dealt with similar issues in my own work (I run a platform with a lot of content posted daily and have multiple tiers of spam control in place). The spam I'm seeing on YouTube is not the difficult kind, yet they're doing nothing to deter it. That's my complaint. I've probably reported hundreds of these, so at the very least, stop recommending videos with the exact same title, description and content to me. It's ridiculous.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > they're on the front page of my recommendations right now Can you share some examples? I’ve never seen what you’re taking about. My front page is all channels I subscribe to.
  - curiousgeorgio 5y ago
    https://imgur.com/a/vzGvyvS https://imgur.com/a/vzGvyvS Even if spam detection didn't flag this stuff, their content ID system should be able to identify it as content stolen from other channels (with a fake tweet added at the top), then calling it "live".
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      I can’t find that video even by specifically searching for it! Maybe it is suppressed for most users and something about your viewing profile opts you in? I’ve never seen anything like this video or anything else that looks like a scam on YouTube. Everything on my recommended page is pretty relevant to my interests and seems legitimate.
hamiltonians 5y ago
A long time ago social media companies realized that spam, users getting scammed does does hurt engagement, so not worth devoting much money to fix it. YouTube has probably 1/2 billion users. A few thousands getting ripped off by scams is immaterial. Algos are a scammer's best friend, cause all you have to do is stay one step ahead of the algo . Human moderators would nip this shit in the bud. Such videos would last minutes on Reddit but they last forever on youtube.
Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
>As for your actual question, I haven't actually been seeing this in my recommendations (but then again, I don't have anything related to cryptocurrency or Elon Musk in my recommendations) I think that's the key, I think OP is finding the spam/scam by searching for content which are prone to exploitation, that said the questions raised by OP are valid. I think YT algorithm actively pushes these scam to the top just because people who made similar searches clicked on those videos because of clickbait thumbnail/title, through which YT made good money through ads and scammers made good money through... scam.

by jsnell 5y ago

SilverRed 5y ago

We may as well think of the spammers as their own ML whos aim and weighting is to fool the spam prevention. So as good as you make the spam AI, the spammer AI evolves to be better than it since they keep iterating until they find whatever formula does not trip the spam protection. >Any human being or half-decent algorithm would be able to catch these with no trouble at all And this statement from OP is blatantly false because if it was true, no human would fall for the scams. But they do fall for them, in huge volumes. Especially if the scams appear to come from a known authority like Elon, the police, your boss, etc. And if you did find a half decent algorithm that worked, the spammers would just iterate again to make spam that doesn't trip it.

curiousgeorgio 5y ago
> And if you did find a half decent algorithm that worked, the spammers would just iterate again to make spam that doesn't trip it. So, the solution is not to even try? How has that worked out for other platforms?
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  Is it a major problem? The scams seem super obvious, and if you subscribe to more content you’re interested in I guess they’d go away. Are they really causing you a problem?
  - curiousgeorgio 5y ago
    I don't subscribe to any channels. Up until this point, their recommendation algorithm has been great, and I'd love for it to stay that way. Major problem? No. Increasing annoyance? Absolutely. > The scams seem super obvious Exactly. That's why I can't fathom why YT keeps letting them through.
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      > I don't subscribe to any channels. Well that’s definitely where you’re going wrong! Subscribing is a strong signal to the algorithm. It’s having to guess otherwise. And at the moment I guess you’re feeding the algorithm with a stream of engagement with all these videos you’re linking to, digging yourself deeper! Stop engaging with them, and subscribe to content you like instead. I never get any videos even remotely like this in my feed - I get videos related to things I subscribe to. You need to give the system some quality input. It isn’t magic. Garbage in garbage out.
      - curiousgeorgio 5y ago
        Nope - I'm not going to start subscribing to channels. Their algorithm has plenty to work with based on my watch history and my spam reports (I've reported every single one of these scams I've come across, usually directly from the recommendations page - not even clicking to watch the video itself). I'm interested in such a wide range of topics that I prefer recommendations based on individual videos I've watched rather than specific creators/channels. I'm glad you don't get these in your feed, but based on others in this thread, it sounds like I'm not that unique in experiencing the issue.

curiousgeorgio 5y ago

Yes, I understand that a regex isn't a long-term solution, but if you've actually seen any of these pop up on YouTube (they're on the front page of my recommendations right now; I've seen probably 30 just today), you'll know what I'm talking about. These are what I'd call "low-hanging fruit" spam – extremely easily distinguished from real content. After months of it happening (and I've seen literally hundreds of the exact same type of video recommended to me), a simple solution would undoubtedly be effective, or at least better than nothing. Get a single intern to double-check the ones that your algorithm identifies to avoid FPs. If the scammers get more sophisticated, cross that bridge when you get to it. But solve the immediate, easy issues now. It's seriously not that hard. This isn't the kind of difficult ML-generated spam that you're probably thinking of, and I agree - at that point it does become a game of cat and mouse. At that point, I'd be understanding when it sneaks through the cracks. I've dealt with similar issues in my own work (I run a platform with a lot of content posted daily and have multiple tiers of spam control in place). The spam I'm seeing on YouTube is not the difficult kind, yet they're doing nothing to deter it. That's my complaint. I've probably reported hundreds of these, so at the very least, stop recommending videos with the exact same title, description and content to me. It's ridiculous.

chrisseaton 5y ago
> they're on the front page of my recommendations right now Can you share some examples? I’ve never seen what you’re taking about. My front page is all channels I subscribe to.
- curiousgeorgio 5y ago
  https://imgur.com/a/vzGvyvS https://imgur.com/a/vzGvyvS Even if spam detection didn't flag this stuff, their content ID system should be able to identify it as content stolen from other channels (with a fake tweet added at the top), then calling it "live".
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    I can’t find that video even by specifically searching for it! Maybe it is suppressed for most users and something about your viewing profile opts you in? I’ve never seen anything like this video or anything else that looks like a scam on YouTube. Everything on my recommended page is pretty relevant to my interests and seems legitimate.

hamiltonians 5y ago

A long time ago social media companies realized that spam, users getting scammed does does hurt engagement, so not worth devoting much money to fix it. YouTube has probably 1/2 billion users. A few thousands getting ripped off by scams is immaterial. Algos are a scammer's best friend, cause all you have to do is stay one step ahead of the algo . Human moderators would nip this shit in the bud. Such videos would last minutes on Reddit but they last forever on youtube.

Abishek_Muthian 5y ago

>As for your actual question, I haven't actually been seeing this in my recommendations (but then again, I don't have anything related to cryptocurrency or Elon Musk in my recommendations) I think that's the key, I think OP is finding the spam/scam by searching for content which are prone to exploitation, that said the questions raised by OP are valid. I think YT algorithm actively pushes these scam to the top just because people who made similar searches clicked on those videos because of clickbait thumbnail/title, through which YT made good money through ads and scammers made good money through... scam.