YouTube updates gambling content rules, clarifies certification standards, and reframes dramatized violence guidance

YouTube updated its Community Guidelines to adjust wording around dramatized violence and online gambling.

The platform replaced language describing “people being tortured, dismembered, or decapitated” with a broader reference to violence against non-combatants in its age-restriction criteria for fictional or dramatized content.

YouTube also changed its gambling rules to focus on online gambling sites not certified by Google, replacing prior references to unapproved gambling sites. Related examples were updated to clarify that content may depict or promote online gambling when it involves certified sites, and now also include social/sweepstakes casinos.