Google and YouTube are in hot water over questionable content that is connected to international advertising companies such as AT&T, Verizon and Enterprise.

The Wall Street Journal reported today that PepsiCo, Wal-Mart, Dish Network have stated they are suspending Google non-search ads.

Google and YouTube made a statement covering their safeguards:

• Safer default for brands. We’re changing the default settings for ads so that they show on content that meets a higher level of brand safety and excludes potentially objectionable content that advertisers may prefer not to advertise against. Brands can opt in to advertise on broader types of content if they choose.
• Simplified management of exclusions. We’ll introduce new account-level controls to make it easier for advertisers to exclude specific sites and channels from all of their AdWords for Video and Google Display Network campaigns, and manage brand safety settings across all their campaigns with a push of a button.
• More fine-tuned controls. In addition, we’ll introduce new controls to make it easier for brands to exclude higher risk content and fine-tune where they want their ads to appear.

So starting today, we’re taking a tougher stance on hateful, offensive and derogatory content. This includes removing ads more effectively from content that is attacking or harassing people based on their race, religion, gender or similar categories. This change will enable us to take action, where appropriate, on a larger set of ads and sites. – Philipp Schindler, Chief Business Officer at Google

Our company understand that hate groups will attempt to spread their negative narrative via any form of communication. As a smaller company, I focused heavily on how our brand advertises content. I see that Google and YouTube have made steps forward to curb this problem by giving advertising companies options to pinpoint their target audience.

It is important to match advertisers to content that goes along with their target audience. That being said, Google and YouTube are the first and second largest search engines. The companies that avoid spending on advertising on YouTube now will need to rethink that strategy around the holiday season. Which is why I find a boycott to be meaningless. What I do support is pushing for Google, and other companies to focus on providing the best user experience possible.

The Los Angeles Times reports that AT&T needs Google to ensure that new precautions are in place before they return.

Reuters has a video below to view on YouTube covering YouTube.