YouTube filters fail to mop up nude creators parading raunchy content as ‘transparent cleaning’

Scantily clad women performing household chores are the latest content creators to peddle soft porn to kids on YouTube.

Scantily clad women performing household chores are the latest content creators to peddle soft porn to kids on YouTube.

The revelation comes just weeks before Communications Minister Anika Wells makes a decision on whether YouTube will be included in an under-16s social media ban.

Google-owned YouTube has rallied its content creators to oppose the ban which it warns will impact “creators, parents, teachers and millions of Australian youth.”

But The Daily Telegraph can reveal the channel is packed with inappropriate content including reels under the search “transparent cleaning” which show young women wearing see-through clothing and performing chores like mopping the floor.

Some of the posts even carry disclaimers that they are “providing cleaning tips” and the sheer negligees and see-through body stockings are “casual and comfortable home outfits” that are “not intended to be provocative or sexually suggestive.”

A trend on YouTube called ‘transparent cleaning’ shows women in transparent nearly nude outfits.

Cybersecurity expert Dr Vladas Leonas, author of‘Cyber Insecurity’, said the reels were a blatant example of creators exploiting loopholes in the platform filters.

“YouTube made $36 billion from advertising in 2024, a 14 per cent increase on the previous year. In order to generate advertising revenue YouTube needs content that people will watch. Obviously some creators have worked out the key terms and filters that will see their content removed and found a way around it,” he said.

“This means that explicit content like ‘transparent cleaning’ is available on YouTube and can be accessed by anyone with a free account, potentially including children, which is obviously inappropriate.”

eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant has said that a survey of children found that four out of 10 had reported exposure to harmful content on YouTube.

A disclaimer before one video.

“This also comes as the New York Times reported earlier this month that YouTube surreptitiously rolled back its content moderation processes to keep more harmful content on its platform, even when the content violates the company’s own policies,” she told The National Press Club in Canberra.

“This really underscores the challenge of evaluating a platform’s relative safety at a single point in time, particularly as we see platform after platform winding back their trust and safety teams and weakening policies designed to minimise harm, making these platforms evermore perilous for our children.”

Ms Inman Grant has refused to reveal whether lobbyists aligned to Chinese owned TikTok pressured her staffers to ban YouTube for children at an introductory meeting when she took over the portfolio in May.

A page on YouTube showing the huge number of "transparent cleaning" of women in transparent nearly nude outfits.

She has now provided advice to the Minister that YouTube should not be exempt from the under-16s ban that will apply to other platforms.

A spokesman for Ms Wells said: “The Minister is carefully considering the eSafety Commission’s advice on the draft Social Media Minimum Age Rules. Her top priority is making sure the draft Rules fulfil the objective of the Act – protecting children from the harms of social media.”

Originally published as YouTube filters fail to mop up nude creators parading raunchy content as ‘transparent cleaning’