TikTok shares new initiatives to ‘strengthen transparency and accountability’

In brief

TikTok has announced a number of new initiatives to “strengthen transparency and accountability on our platform”.

They include:

• Providing application programming interface (API) access to public and anonymized data about content and activity to research the TikTok platform and make public its findings
• Providing API access to researchers for studies on TikTok’s moderation system.
• Deepening information sharing with TikTok’s Content and Safety Advisory Councils, a group of independent experts who will also be granted API access and access to other confidential information, such as TikTok’s “keyword lists” which are used to help detect and flag potentially harmful content.
• Expanding transparency reports with information about countering covert influence operations that could lead to misleading users.

TikTok has come under intense scrutiny from the US government in the past few months for conceding that certain employees in China “might need access to data” after a BuzzFeed News report revealed US data had been repeatedly accessed from China.

Interview: How TikTok will lean into culture, commerce and livestreams — Stuart Flint and Trevor Johnson talk to the The Media Leader about what’s next