Apple co-founder is suing Google and YouTube

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and 17 others are suing YouTube and Google for failing controls on their platform. The complaint states that “tens of millions of dollars were lost in the cryptocurrency in this fraud” and YouTube could have prevented it. Complainants want compensation for fraud running for months on a giant video-sharing platform.

Wozniak said his pictures and videos, along with others such as Elon Musk and Bill Gates, are being used on YouTube for bitcoin scams. They take the form of live videos with deceptive text, where they entice viewers to send Bitcoins (or other cryptocurrencies) if they want to multiply the revenue. Needless to say, victims do not get their money back.

If Twitter can do it, why can’t YouTube?

The complainants alleged that they had flagged the fraud several times on YouTube and Google – but received no response. Instead, the two companies actively promoted it and profited from defamation by consciously providing targeted advertising to fraudsters.

“If YouTube had acted quickly to stop it reasonably, we wouldn’t be here now. YouTube, like Google, seems to rely solely on algorithms. If such a crime is committed, you must be prepared to reach out to people who can stop it. What kind of person would see such contributions and not immediately ban them as frauds? “Wozniak said.

Apple co-founder added that the scam had caused – and continues to cause – damage to its reputation and that of other complainants.

Joe Cotchett, one of the lawyers representing Steve Wozniak, praised Twitter for his swift action last week:

“When Twitter was hit by a massive hack of 130 celebrity accounts, it was able to take action against bitcoin fraud in one day.”

He accuses YouTube of incompetence:

“In contrast, YouTube deliberately allowed the bitcoin scam to continue for months, promoting it and profiting from it by selling ads.”

Brian Danitz, another law firm partner, said the fraud was huge and affected users in all geographies. “The scale of the bitcoin “giveaway” scams on YouTube is huge. The victims of this complaint come from all over the world, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, China and all of Europe, “he said.

A Whale Alerts report this month concluded that fraudsters earned $ 24 million from the scams in the first six months of 2020, with one YouTube ad earning $ 130,000 in one day. In just the last hour (at the time of writing this article) it was another 1.9 BTC.

You might also like: Bitcoin Mining Software Guide