Eagle-eyed Twitter users noticed something odd about Google’s search function this week. When searching for a term, Google normally throws up suggested phrases based on how often they’ve been searched before, and how popular they currently are. Type in “New Statesman is” and you get the suggestions “New Statesman isis”, “New Statesman israel” and “New Statesman islamophobia” (slander!).
“Labour is” or “Labour are” yield similarly colourful (and slanderous) results:
Yet the Conservative party, lately slammed in the press for striking a deal that would allegedly allow Google to pay less than 3 per cent corporation tax in the UK, gets off much more lightly. In fact, there’s no autocomplete options at all:
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Meanwhile, according to autocomplete, the SNP are “liars”, “Nazis” and “a joke”, and the Liberal Democrats are “finished” and, er, “left wing”.
So is the internet giant blocking negative messages about their chums in the Tory party on purpose? These folks on Twitter certainly think so:
“Ta for the tax thing. Want us to nix any bad press, given we control the internet?”
“Nah, just rig autocomplete.”https://t.co/uThrIZnrLL— Tom Evans (@TomEvansEcho) February 2, 2016
So Google know when they’re onto a good thing – kowtowing to the Conservative manipulation of the media! https://t.co/8Z7upCoxLF #fb
— Simon Douglas (@SimonADouglas) February 3, 2016
Your mole isn’t so sure – and further digging suggests the coincidence could be just that.
First, Google totally denies the accusation. A representative told the Guardian yesterday:
“[We] can categorically state that tax is not remotely connected to this, nor are their ‘conspiracy theories’ founded in any way… Autocomplete predictions are produced based on a number of factors including the popularity of search terms.”
Your mole also has a hunch that the most popular negative search phrase used about the Conservatives would be both alliterative and very rude – rude enough to be removed from the suggestions under Google’s search terms policy, which bans “hate or violence related suggestions” or “porn and adult content related suggestions”. It is undeniably strange, though, that nothing comes up at all.
However, if you type “the Conservative party is”, you get suggestions more in line with what you’d expect:
So if it is a conspiracy, it’s not a particularly well-executed one.