Google Denies Elon Musk's Accusations About Boycotting Donald Trump

Google Dismisses Elon Musk's Accusations Regarding Boycotting Donald Trump Photo: Getty Images/NICOLAS MAETERLINCK

HOLIDAY NEWS - Google responded to accusations that it was censoring search results about Donald Trump, one of which was made by Elon Musk.

In his accusation, Musk said that Google circumvented the autocomplete feature in the Google search engine when searching for the keyword "President Donald". According to Google, this is simply due to a bug in the autocomplete feature.

"In recent days, several people at X have said that Search is censoring or blocking certain keywords. This is not true," Google said in a statement on X/Twitter.

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Google did not directly mention Musk's name in the statement. However, the owner of Tesla, SpaceX and

In this accusation, Musk showed a screenshot of Search which displayed autocomplete for the keyword "President Donald", and none of the autocompletes displayed the result "President Donald Trump".

Instead what appears are "president donald duck" and "president donald regan" when typing the keyword "President Donald".

On the same day as Musk's accusation, Donald Trump Jr. -- Donald Trump's son -- also posted a similar screenshot, which is related to a Google search regarding the attempted assassination of his father.

Neither Trump Jr. and Musk together accused Google with the same narrative, namely disrupting the presidential election process in the United States, as quoted by detikINET from Engadget, Thursday (1/8/2024).

In its statement, Google also explained that its users are free to search for any keywords and are not bound by the autocomplete suggestions displayed. Google also said it had a protection system regarding political searches related to violence, which created an autocomplete feature related to Trump, and Google admitted this system was outdated.

Meanwhile, regarding the autocomplete "donald duck" and "donald regan", Google called it a bug that occurred in the realm of political searches. This bug has also previously occurred for President Barack Obama and other important people.

Google Tepis Tudingan Elon Musk Soal Boikot Donald Trump

Google Tepis Tudingan Elon Musk Soal Boikot Donald Trump Foto: Getty Images/NICOLAS MAETERLINCK

HOLIDAY NEWS -

Google merespon tudingan bahwa mereka menyensor hasil pencarian soal Donald Trump, yang salah satunya dilontarkan oleh Elon Musk.

Dalam tudingannya, Musk menyebut Google mengakali fitur autocomplete dalam mesin pencari Google saat mencari dengan kata kunci "President Donald". Menurut Google, hal itu semata karena bug dalam fitur autocomplete.

"Dalam beberapa hari terakhir, beberapa orang di X menyebut kalau Search menyensor atau memblokir kata kunci tertentu. Hal itu tidak benar," kata Google dalam pernyataannya di X/Twitter.

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Google memang tak langsung menyebut nama Musk dalam pernyataan tersebut. Namun pemilik Tesla, SpaceX, dan X itu memang menjadi sosok yang meramaikan isu penyensoran kata kunci Donald Trump oleh Google.

Dalam tudingan tersebut, Musk menunjukkan screenshot Search yang menampilkan autocomplete dari kata kunci "President Donald", dan tak satupun dari autocomplete itu menampilkan hasil "President Donald Trump".

Malah yang muncul adalah "president donald duck" dan "president donald regan" saat mengetik kata kunci "President Donald".

Pada hari yang sama dengan tudingan Musk itu, Donald Trump Jr. -- anak Donald Trump -- juga memposting screenshot senada, yaitu terkait pencarian di Google soal percobaan pembunuhan terhadap ayahnya itu.

Baik Trump Jr. maupun Musk kompak menuding Google dengan narasi yang sama, yaitu mengganggu proses pemilihan presiden di Amerika Serikat, demikian dikutip detikINET dari Engadget, Kamis (1/8/2024).

Dalam pernyataannya, Google juga menjelaskan bahwa penggunanya bebas untuk mencari kata kunci apapun dan tidak terikat dengan saran autocomplete yang ditampilkan. Google juga menyebut mereka punya sistem perlindungan soal pencarian politik terkait kekerasan, yang membuat fitur autocomplete terkait Trump, dan Google mengakui sistem ini sudah ketinggalan zaman.

Sementara itu soal autocomplete "donald duck" dan "donald regan", Google menyebutnya sebagai bug yang terjadi di ranah pencarian politik. Bug ini juga sebelumnya pernah terjadi untuk Presiden Barack Obama dan orang penting lainnya.