Fans of the popular YouTuber PewDiePie, real name Felix Kjellberg, accused Google on Thursday of âshadowbanningâ the creator.
Google told the Daily Dot in a statement on Thursday that it is âhearing reports that PewDiePieâs channel and some videos are not surfacing within searches. We are currently working on fixing the issue. We are sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.â
Supporters of the YouTuber began reporting across social media that Kjellbergâs videos no longer showed up in the results after searching for âPewDiePieâ on the platform.
âPewdiepie may have been shadowbanned by YouTube,â @defnoodles said. âHis channel no longer appears in search, and only 1 of his videos appears in the top results. His latest video got 34k views, 1k comments, 4.8 likes in 1 hour.â
Other users noted that notifications from Kjellberg, whose channel boasts an astonishing 107 million subscribers, did not appear on Thursday after his most recent video was uploaded.
âHis subs also didnât receive a notification about his video from today,â @linzasaur added. âSome are saying itâs a shadowban, but itâs not clear what the suppression could be about.
The Daily Dot tested out the numerous claims by searching for the term âPewDiePieâ on YouTube and discovered that Kjellbergâs channel was not presented as a result.
The top 3 results, although related to PewDiePie, were not from his channel. The fourth result was in fact a video produced by PewDiePie but from more than 1 year ago.
PewDiePieâs latest video did not appear under the subscriptions tab while using an account subscribed to Kjellbergâs channel either.
A second search for âPewDiePieâ shortly after did show Kjellbergâs channel as the top result, although the videos listed below it remained the same. Users on Twitter appeared to notice the change as well.
On the official TeamYouTube Twitter account, the company responded to numerous tweets made by Kjellbergâs supporters.
âThanks for tagging us â weâre looking into it and weâll update you once we know more,â @TeamYouTube said.
When asked why PewDiePie wasnât initially showing up in searches, however, TeamYouTube seemed to suggest that it did not see an issue.
âAppreciate the tag â search on YouTube strives to surface the most relevant results and videos are ranked based on a variety of factors,â @TeamYouTube said before offering instructions on how to use the platformâs âadvanced filters.â
It remains unclear whether the issue is one related to a purposeful change by YouTube or merely a mistake.