Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) and more than a dozen of his Democratic colleagues are urging YouTube to do more to prevent teens from being able to watch videos about making and modifying guns – after some loopholes in the platform’s new rules still allowed young users to watch similar content.
“We hope that this will not only cause YouTube to very quickly correct any lack of enforcement, but will also be a message to other social media and digital media sites that they must enforce their own policies,” Goldman told Gothamist, after writing a letter to YouTube CEO Neal Mohan that was signed by 15 other members of Congress from around the country.
After Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg sent a letter earlier this year calling on YouTube to stop showing ghost gun making videos to children, the platform introduced a new stipulation to prevent users under 18 from being able to view firearm-related content, and banning tutorials about removing gun safety devices.
According to YouTube’s user guidelines, the platform doesn’t allow any videos that show viewers how to make guns, ammunition or install certain firearm accessories. It also automatically bans any live streams that show people holding, handling or transporting guns, per the guidelines.
But recent studies have demonstrated gaps in the enforcement of those rules.
In August, a 14-year-old using a test account successfully accessed gun-related videos that should have been blocked under the new policy, according to a recent report from the Tech Transparency Project. The test user was able to access tutorial videos on how to make semi-automatic pistols fire like machine guns.
In his letter, Goldman cited another example from the report where a “teen” test user searched for the phrase “how to put a,” and the platform suggested the completed phrase “how to put a switch on a glock.” When the same account began typing “how to 3D,” the platform suggested “how to 3D print a glock switch.”
“There’s no question that some people do misstate their age when they log in. But what the Tech Transparency Report showed is that even when there is a test case of a 14-year-old, that 14-year-old got access to videos that any 14-year-old should not,” Goldman said. “YouTube needs to take the proper measures to ensure that that does not happen.”
In his earlier letter, DA Bragg emphasized a link between similar YouTube videos and the proliferation of ghost gun distributors and manufacturers in New York City.
“In a number of cases before my office, young individuals who are being investigated for ghost gun possession and manufacturing tell a similar story and have explicitly stated they have learned to build ghost guns on YouTube — with some learning how to do so in less than an hour,” he wrote.
Bragg also cited a significant increase in ghost gun seizures, according to the NYPD. In 2020, the department recovered 150 ghost guns; by 2023, that number had jumped to almost 400.
Goldman called ghost guns a “growing problem,” and said his office is working to ensure that the city’s buyback programs actually destroy the guns – rather than allowing them to be recycled and potentially repurposed.
He said parents can take action themselves to limit kids’ access to certain YouTube keywords, but said the real brunt of the responsibility falls to the online platforms.
“Ultimately, YouTube is going to be held accountable,” Goldman said. “I would advise them to quickly rectify this problem so it doesn’t escalate.”
YouTube did not respond to a request for comment.