Slain Journalist's Father Files Complaint Against YouTube, Google to Remove Video of Her Murder

Andy Parker filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission against Google and YouTube.

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Alison Parker, a reporter, was shot and killed on live television nearly five years ago while conducting an interview. Her father is now trying to prevent the video of the murder from being spread any further online,the Washington Post reports.

Andy Parker filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission against Google and YouTube Thursday, alleging that the video streaming service violates its Terms of Service by keeping graphic videos and content that promotes conspiracy theories online. Google owns YouTube.

For years, Parker has had to deal with conspiracists sharing videos of his daughter's death. "These videos have been edited in numerous ways—in almost every case to increase their shock value," Parker's complaint reads, according to The Verge. "Moreover, the users who perpetuate this type of entertainment continue to harass Mr. Parker by discounting his suffering as fake."

Alison Parker was murdered along with cameraman Andy Ward by a former co-worker, Vester Lee Flanagan in 2015. Though clips of the footage go directly against YouTube's guidelines, plenty of clips are still on YouTube.

"We rigorously enforce these policies using a combination of machine learning technology and human review and over the last few years, we’ve removed thousands of copies of this video for violating our policies," a spokesperson for YouTube told the technology-news online magazine. "We will continue to stay vigilant and improve our policy enforcement."

The complaint how friends and family had to watch the videos of Alison's death repeatedly, and flag them for removal. "Mr. Parker and his family have had only one tool available to defend themselves from such traumatic vitrioll," it reads, "and the nightmare of seeing their daughter’s death: watch these videos one-by-one in order to report them."

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