Is Google biased against conservative media publishers?
Conservative pundits, politicians, and even the President of the United States himself have accused Google of bias against conservative news publishers when it comes to their search engine ranking. SEO company Ahrefs has published a study that finds that conservative news publishers such as Breitbart, the New York Post, and the Washington Times see less traffic than liberal news sites. So what is the root of these accusations and why may conservative media publishers consistently rank lower than liberal media publishers? This research, combined with the concepts of hubs and authorities, and Page Rank, demonstrate that it is not bias that prevents these publishers from ranking high, but is more likely influenced by popularity and amount of content.
Authority/Popularity
Here I define the popularity of a hub or authority based on the votes they receive making the lists highly valued and then the authority highly endorsed if they have many of these lists linking to them. Conservative news publishers tend to receive less traffic than liberal news sites. Ahrefs posits that this may be due to Conservatives’ tendency to use Google search and social media less. This reasoning aligns well with the concept of both hubs and authorities and basic Page Rank. With fewer conservatives using google search or the internet in general for their news, thus fewer hubs/lists should exist that point towards specific conservative news publishers. This in turn affects the Page Rank, as we can assume that conservative news publishers then have fewer links to them and thus lower page ranks.
Amount of content
In addition to their popularity affording many other in-links to their websites, establishing them as authorities, Ahrefs reports that liberal news sources have eight times more pages indexed than Conservative news publishers. As a result, the Liberal news sites with the highest authority rankings generally have more chances to rank for different things than the top Conservative news sites. Additionally, this increases the scores of their hubs, which they most likely have more edges from since they rank for different things, which in turn increases their authority scores, again reinforcing their high authority rankings.
Alternatively, USC Professor Safiya Noble and author of the book Algorithms of Oppression, argues that this bias actually exists against another group, women of color (in this sense, news publishers that cater to women of color). In terms of sponsored search, this can be explained by the fact that women of color are least likely to have the ability to “…purchase keywords and least likely to technically optimize content in their own interests.” which Noble told the New Yorker.
Ultimately, the ranking of pages and positions of queries and news that serve certain groups are reliant on their authority/popularity and the amount of content that they have (organic or paid advertisements). This in turn puts certain groups at a disadvantage over others, which is most pronounced for those who are the least connected and who have the least resources.
Sources:
https://ahrefs.com/blog/is-google-biased/
https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/8/7/20756726/trump-google-biased-conservatives-how-search-works-explained