Twitch Makes U.S. Army Stop Fake Giveaways And Recruitment

Twitch has exposed the U.S. Army for having a channel that redirects viewers to a recruitment page.

After being exposed last week for issuing bans to viewers who asked about war crimes, the U.S. Army’s Twitch channel was shown to be running fake giveaways leading to a recruitment page. Following this expose, Twitch has announced that it has forced the Army to stop.

According to The Nation, the giveaways—which took place “repeatedly” in chat—offered viewers a chance to win an Xbox Elite Series 2 controller. Clicking the associated link, however, would send viewers to a recruitment page “with no additional mention of a contest, odds, total number of winners, or when a drawing will occur.”

Twitch viewers and streamers, as expected, were incredulous upon learning this. “The silence from Twitch on the latest wave of criticism regarding the military using the site to scam kids into sharing personal info speaks volumes,” said streamer Jayson “@ManVsGame” Love on Twitter. “Imagine any other channel doing that. Feel free to manipulate your viewers as much as you like, I guess?”

“Hey Twitch, is using your platform to run scams always against the [terms of service] or does the US Army get a special exception when they’re after kids’ blood instead of money?” game developer Bruno Dias said on Twitter.

Twitch has now taken appropriate action against this disingenuous act. “Per our Terms of Service, promotions on Twitch must comply with all applicable laws,” a Twitch spokesperson told Kotaku in an email. “This promotion did not comply with our Terms, and we have required them to remove it.”

Kotaku reached out to the U.S. Army esports team for information on why they chose to run these faux-giveaways in the first place, but they did not reply.

In addition to running a Twitch channel, America’s armed forces are also an official sponsor of Twitch’s esports brand and channel, Twitch Rivals. This means, that the Army’s logo appears on the side of esports broadcasts centered around big-name games like “League of Legends,” “Valorant,” and even chess, which features multiple popular personalities.

Commentators also periodically shout out the U.S. Army as they would any corporate sponsor, something that has irritated viewers in the past. Two sources speaking to Kotaku under the condition of anonymity said that this deal likely cost the Army around $1 million.

The Army has long used advertising and propaganda to recruit people, so much so that many Americans barely even notice it anymore. But this ploy to use fake giveaways for the sake of recruitment just stunk of dishonesty and deception.