Your YouTube Subscribers: Real or Fake?

Your YouTube Subscribers: Real or Fake?

Can I get fake subscribers on YouTube?
How can I get 1k subscribers for free?
Can I buy 1000 YouTube subscribers?
Can YouTube detect fake views?
Check Video Views vs. Engagements

While some rogue video creators may be making money with their false popularity, the companies that advertise on YouTube must be cautious and should not fall prey to the trickery happening on the video-sharing site.

#YouTube #YouTubeSubscribers #FakeYouTubeSubscribers #SocialMedia #FreeYouTubeSubscribers #YouTubeVideo

By Rakesh Raman

Only the mysteries of Egyptian mummies come somewhere close to the extent of enigma that social media has brought to the digital world. Do we really understand social media?

As an ordinary user, you mostly get illusioned or impressed by the number of Facebook fans, Twitter followers, or YouTube subscribers of a person or a brand. But did you know that you can buy fake fans, followers, or subscribers like you buy onions and potatoes in the vegetable market?

And believe me, these bogus followers are cheaper than many commodities available in the market today. But as they are fake, do they help you achieve your professional objectives?

After publishing my recent research about Twitter and the digital deception happening on Twitter, I have now studied the modus operandi of YouTube channels and their owners.

At first sight, I was flabbergasted to see the viewers’ craze toward some so-called YouTube influencers and their video clips. Their channels claim to have millions of subscribers and each of their videos attracted hundreds of thousands or millions of views.

I delved deeper and found that even the run-of-the-mill videos in which these “celebrity” YouTube channel owners discussed something about the number of pieces in a bread box, or rat repellents, or a simple walk in the park were getting a swarm of viewers, besides zillions of likes and comments full of admiration.

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I was disturbed, shocked, and terrified all at the same time because these ordinary videos challenged my decades of work that I have produced as an award-winning journalist and a leading content creator. I was hardly getting any viewers or subscribers on my YouTube channel that I began building recently.

My uncontrollable curiosity took me to Google search to decode the mystery of the YouTube ecosystem. I found that like other frauds happening on social media, YouTube is also a victim of huge deception.

There are a slew of web stories which reveal that the fake YouTube subscribers are openly on sale or you can even hope to get free subscribers. Along with subscribers, you can also buy views, likes, comments for your YouTube videos no matter how good or bad your videos are.

Although YouTube has something called “Fake engagement policy” which aims to stop fraudulent practices on the site, the policy does not work effectively. The Fake engagement policy states that:

“YouTube doesn’t allow anything that artificially increases the number of views, likes, comments, or other metrics either by using automatic systems or serving up videos to unsuspecting viewers. Also, content that solely exists to incentivize viewers for engagement (views, likes, comments, etc) is prohibited. Content and channels that don’t follow this policy may be terminated and removed from YouTube.”

However, despite YouTube’s warning, the frauds are rampant on the site. The video makers make misleading thumbnails with their funny photos to deceive the viewers and artificially inflate their number of subscribers, views, likes, and comments.

But the videos that show millions of views or thousands of likes and comments under them are, in fact, tasteless pieces of crudely made visuals that lack engaging content. 

The fake engagement on YouTube is not only through purchased profiles, but there are also automated subscriber generators which keep adding fictitious subscribers to the channel which may or may not be real.

Shockingly, some of these bogus channels are also earning money through advertisements that appear in their YouTube videos. Some video creators who have fake subscribers also position themselves as social media influencers to cheat and fleece companies which hire them to promote their brands.

And it appears that YouTube has no mechanism to detect and deal with this type of deception that is happening under its very nose. While some rogue video creators may be making money with their false popularity, the companies that advertise on YouTube must be cautious and should not fall prey to the trickery happening on the video-sharing site.

By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and founder of the humanitarian organization RMN Foundation. Earlier, he was writing an exclusive edit-page tech business column (named Technophile) regularly for The Financial Express (a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group). He had also been associated with the United Nations (UN) through the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development.