In a surprising revelation, Google has confessed to censoring search results related to the assassination attempt on former GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump.
The tech giant, however, attributed this to an outdated algorithm.
According to the Gateway Pundit, the counsel for Alphabet, Google's parent company, made this admission during a hearing before the House Judiciary Committee. The counsel explained that the autocomplete algorithm did not display results about the assassination attempt on Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. This was due to a policy against searches for topics related to political violence, as reported by National Review.
In a peculiar twist, similar "glitches" also prevented autocomplete suggestions when users typed in "President Donald" or displayed news stories about Vice President Kamala Harris when users were searching for Trump. "The attorney said the bugs were fixed after they were brought to Googles attention," National Review reported.
This revelation came in response to a letter from Judiciary Committee Chair Rep. Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. The letter detailed these issues and expressed concerns about potential interference in the 2024 presidential election.
"Recent reporting has indicated that Google may now be interfering in the 2024 presidential election by censoring information about former President Donald Trumps ongoing campaign for the presidency, including relating to the July 13 assassination attempt on him in Pennsylvania," Jordan wrote.
During a private briefing, Google's counsel provided somewhat unconvincing explanations for these anomalies, which had been noticed by many on social media, including tech mogul Elon Musk. The counsel admitted that "predictions for queries about the assassination attempt against former President Trump should have appeared but didnt," attributing this to outdated protections against political violence.
When questioned about Trump's name not appearing in autocomplete, the counsel blamed a "bug." As for the issue of searching for Trump and getting news about Harris, Google stated that "predictions may be unexpected or imperfect, and bugs will occur."
Jordan, in his letter, posed a series of questions to Pichai, the most crucial being: "How can the American people be confident that a similar issue, whether intentional or not, will not occur again?"
This incident comes at a time when Google is facing a significant antitrust case. However, the company's response to these serious allegations of election interference has been less than satisfactory. This is not just about a single error involving a forgotten assassination attempt, but also about the erasure of an entire administration and news about the GOP presidential candidate.
If such incidents were not favoring Democrats or occurring outside the United States, the outcry from liberal politicians would be deafening. However, the silence from liberal Washington is telling. It's intriguing how these algorithm errors always seem to favor one side, particularly when that side aligns with Google's corporate leanings.
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