Hello YouTuber,
We have reviewed your content and found severe or repeated violations of our community guidelines. Because of this, we have removed your channel from YouTube.
Please don’t panic; we know waking up to this message is jarring, and guess what? Most of the YouTubers were in utter shock after seeing their hard-toiled work going into the drain out of the blue.
But we’ve got you covered. If you know about the updated YouTube guidelines 2024, you can save yourself, dive deeper to learn about the guidelines, and stop your channel from getting suspended by YouTube.
YouTube Guidelines
“We enforce these Community Guidelines using a combination of human reviewers and machine learning, and apply them to everyone equally – regardless of the subject or the creator’s background, political viewpoint, position or affiliation.“
– YouTube
Yes! You have heard it right; YouTube guidelines are stringent, and you could be the most prominent YouTuber in your domain with millions of subscribers. But being unaware and oblivious about the YouTube guidelines will take you down to zero.
Why do they matter, and what are they?
YouTube has a plethora of policies to harmonize the platform. We tried to list a Gist of the significant community guidelines to help you avoid video monetization mistakes and you may have to look at it seriously this time.
1) Spam and deceptive practices
- Fake engagement
- Impersonation
- External links
- Spam, deceptive practices, and scams
- Playlists
- Additional policies
2) Sensitive content
- Child safety
- Thumbnails
- Nudity and sexual content
- Suicide and self-harm
- Vulgar language
3) Violent or dangerous content
- Harassment and cyberbullying
- Harmful or dangerous content
- Hate speech
- Violent criminal organizations
- Violent or graphic content
4) Regulated goods
- Firearms
- Sale of illegal or regulated goods or services
- Misinformation
- Elections misinformation
- COVID-19 medical misinformation
Apart from the Community Guidelines, content creators who monetize content must obey a separate set of Monetization Policies.
The above list identifies the reasons for most of the suspended channels and demonetized YouTube videos. Apart from these, there are exceptional cases where the government can suspend your channel based on the emotions it invokes in its citizens.
Why did channels get suspended?
Content creation is a challenging task. Finding entertaining or informative content to amuse your audiences is as tricky as any other hard-earning job. But, my friend, If your channel has video/audio content that supports any of the reasons mentioned above, your YouTube suspension mail is on its way.
Sometimes you may not notice, but you have to be explicit to have a long run in the industry. So stay away from the below-mentioned content to sustain.
Graphic violence – Bloodshed, predatory behavior
If any of your content promotes violence in graphic forms and assaults characters inspired by real-life or assaults someone, it comes under the graphic violence category.
YouTuber Shirrako, known for his Red Dead Redemption 2 videos, uploaded a short video where crocodiles kill a feminist for standing up against an issue, this crossed the guidelines, and YouTube has removed his channel.
Fake news, misinformation regarding health, society:
During the pandemic, YouTube has temporarily suspended One America News Network (OANN) for spreading misinformation about the COVID-19 cure.
Hate speech:
Several well-known white nationalist channels, including those run by Stefan Molyneux, David Duke, and Richard Spencer, have been blocked on YouTube for releasing content on hate speech.
“After updating our guidelines to better address supremacist content, we saw a 5x spike in video removals and have terminated over 25,000 channels for violating our hate speech policies.” – Said the spokesperson from YouTube.
Effects on other YouTube channels
YouTube won’t just suspend the channel that promotes or crosses the guidelines but also the channels relating to the same user.
In India, YouTube has suspended six news channels for spreading fake news; all those channels are related to one main channel.
Types of Suspension
Know these, because these could be the following reasons why your channel might get suspended in the future.
Community Guidelines Strikes
A community guidelines strike is typically a warning issued by YouTube to the channel owner for violating the guidelines with hate speech, fake news, or misinformation.
If the channel receives a strike repeatedly, the third time, the channel will be suspended or terminated.
Terms of Service Violations –
YouTube has set a considerable set of terms of service violations; find some of the significant essential points below
- You should be above 13 years of age
- You are solely responsible for the content uploaded; copyrights are an issue if you infringe any form of content.
- You should not copy the content or use a bot.
- If your video is flagged with violent or nudity content will be suspended.
Repeated Violations will result in the suspension of your channel.
Public and private videos:
Public videos are videos you upload that the public can access, whereas private videos are only content accessible by you.
Note: Even if your video is private and violates the policies of YouTube, the chances of your channel getting suspended are as high as for public videos.
Other reasons why your channel can be Suspended:
YouTubers who go desperate for viewers and to reap money through monetization will hold many tricks up their sleeves. If youtube suspects these activities, then suspension awaits them.
YouYuber Jake Sandt’s video got demonetized for re-using the same video for promotions, though youTube lists the video for viewers to watch, the channel is still suspended.
Jake’s video has a whopping 19,200,000 views, but it all went in vain.
David Hoffman received the same on his video duplication, and the YouTube support team responded as.
“I understand that you wanted to know more about why your monetization on your channel has been disabled. Unfortunately, we cannot provide you specific details on what guideline your content has violated, and also, we’re not able to provide you where your channel does not comply with YouTube’s Partner Program terms.”
Fake engagement policy:
YouTube has suspended plenty of creators for fake engagement using bots to increase their videos’ likes, views, and comments.
Medical misinformation:
In the past two years, YouTube has suspended many channels which claim to debunk the myths behind Covid-19 vaccines; medical disinformation is something YouTubers should watch out for.
Geo-fencing:
As a YouTuber, you might need to block your videos in certain territories though you own the content. If you upload them to attract views, your channel might get suspended for geo-fencing.
You need to set up an upload policy to block a certain video of yours in a particular territory.
Click baits:
The controversial YouTuber Itsowen, clickbaited the death of famous YouTuber Technoblade with a picture post of Mr.Beast and got his channel suspended, which had around 3.5 million followers.
Unrelated tags:
If YouTube suspects videos featuring misleading and irrelevant tags, it falls under YouTube’s policies on spam, deceptive practices, and scams, and guess what? Your channel or video will be suspended.
Irrelevant links in the description and tags primarily focusing on building viewership also come under scam, and it’s unjustifiable according to YouTube norms.
Any form of metadata, whether it is a thumbnail or title- if you are luring views, then your channel will be suspended.
Negative comments:
If you are not aware of what’s going on in your comments section, it could also lead your channel to be demonetized or suspended. If a video possesses negative and hateful comments, then chances are the video will get demonetized. Sometimes competitor channels spew hate in the comment section. Keep an eye out because you would be wondering when it’s too little to take action.
Buying view:
Buying views is not banned on YouTube, but if you purchase views through redirects and bots, it will land you in trouble.
Copyright:
Before you publish the view to the general audience, proper copyright permission from the owner is a must to avoid suspension. Copyright infringement has led many top YouTubers to face demonetized videos. YouTube takes serious action against copyright infringement.
Top Terminated YouTubers:
- That guy with the glasses got his channel terminated for copyright infringement with Blip.tv
- Wael Abbas got terminated for the complaint raised for the violent graphic content posted on the channel.
- Evalion’s channel, with 1,915,494 views, got suspended for hate speech.
- Even Mr. Beast’s videos have been demonetized for copyright issues regarding the audio used.
What happens to banned YouTube channels?
Once YouTube suspends your channel, you will receive a mail stating the issue. Don’t break down; submit an appeal in the google appeal forum, speak to moderators about the issue, and express your concern.
Wait for the response from YouTube’s end, Youtube will review your account, and if it hasn’t violated any policies, they will retrieve your account.
What not to do:
Don’t tweet about it; it will create a negative impression and make you a crybaby.
How to appeal to YouTube to revoke the termination
If it’s a specific video, then go to YouTube studio and choose content, select the video you want to appeal, and in the restrictions column, select appeal and submit your appeal
The YouTube team will respond in 14 days. Multiple appeals won’t make the process quick. Be patient and check your mail regularly.
If your channel is suspended, then use the below link to appeal.
Appeal for your suspended YouTube channel
Before appealing, make sure you read the conditions presented in the YouTube partner program help center.
What to do if YouTube rejected your Appeal
- Backup all your video content
- Look for the best YouTube alternatives
- Our suggestions for the best alternative:
- GUDSHO: A premium Video monetization platform – You can easily create a channel in GUDSHO; guess what? It’s free, the monetization revenue plans are far above YouTube’s, and you can find many creator-friendly options in their dashboard.
- Dailymotion: Allows you to monetize video content and earn revenue through advertising.
- Patreon: helps users to earn money through subscription fees by creating a paywall for them.
- Vimeo: In Vimeo you can rent, sell your content by making users opt for their pro plans.
- Start a channel and stream your videos
- Rebuild your kingdom
Understanding the reasons behind youtube suspensions can help creators navigate and understand guidelines better. Thanks for sharing these insightful details!
Such an informative article! Most of the hidden secrents about YouTube suspensions are really surprising to me. Thanks.