Fake engagement policy

The policy covers services selling views, likes, comments or subscribers, view bots and artificial live traffic, and sub4sub arrangements where people subscribe only on condition of a subscribe back. YouTube's stated line is that engagement counts as legitimate when a real person's main intent is to interact with the content, and illegitimate when it comes from coercion, deception or pure financial motivation.

Enforcement starts with a warning, then strikes, and three strikes inside 90 days ends the channel. Removed artificial views and spam subscribers are stripped from your totals, so purchased numbers tend to evaporate on their own.