TikTok says it removed over 600 000 videos from South African users for violating its rules.
Over 281 000 local accounts were banned from April to June 2024.
The company says it is now using AI to remove 80 percent of videos that violate rules, most before a human can even watch them.
According to the TikTok Community Guidelines Enforcement report for April to June 2024, published in late September, the social media platform removed 614 406 videos posted by South Africans within the period for violating its rules.
This was less than one percent of the total videos uploaded to TikTok by South Africans during the quarter. A total of 143 998 South African accounts were also banned for uploading videos and other actions that breached community rules, while a further 137 663 local accounts were removed because of suspected underage users.
The social network bans users and removes videos that violate its rules around privacy, security, user safety, spam, fake engagement, advertising and propaganda, or as it terms “influence operations.”
It claims that 98.7 percent of the removed videos were taken offline “proactively” meaning before any user could report them, while 88.4 percent of the videos were cut within 24 hours of being uploaded, showing that the network is working fast to keep its feeds clean and perhaps that its mix of human and AI moderation is working well.
It says of the total 178 million videos that it removed for violating guidelines, 86 percent of them recorded zero views before being deleted. That means that no human saw them, moderators included.
“We invest in technologies that improve content understanding and predict potential risks so that we can take action on violative content before it’s viewed,” the company explains in the report.
“These technical investments also reduce the volume of content that moderators review, helping minimize human exposure to violative content. As a result, automated technology now removes 80% of violative videos, up from 62% a year ago.”
In the past, TikTok moderators in Africa, as well as those moderating content for Meta have claimed that prolonged exposure to violative content, especially containing violent imagery, harms their mental health and causes post-traumatic stress.
“Majority of the content I review daily includes mutilated or dismembered bodies, sadistic videos depicting manslaughter and burning of persons alive, among others,” one former Meta moderator told a Kenyan court in 2023.
TikTok owner ByteDance is reportedly working with Huawei to power its AI moderation efforts, and while it says it is limiting the amount of content human moderations need to see to do their jobs, it failed to include that it is actively cutting its moderation staff by the hundreds in certain markets – the latest in Malaysia.
In the grand scheme of things, the amount of videos removed from South African accounts is small compared to the swathes removed from the US (26 million) and even African countries like Nigeria (2.1 million). South Africa is one of the countries listed in the report, with many countries missing, that has the lowest number of removed videos.
In August, TikTok established an African council of internet and information experts to lead its policies on hate speech and disinformation in the Sub-Saharan Africa region.
“By partnering with key stakeholders, including policymakers, members from academia, NGOs, and community leaders, TikTok aims to foster a collaborative approach to ensuring a secure and positive platform environment,” it explained at the time.
The council includes Prof. Guy Berger from Rhodes University, one of Africa’s foremost experts on online media and internet policy issues.
[Image – Photo by Olivier Bergeron on Unsplash]
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{URL}https://htxt.co.za/2024/10/tiktok-uses-ai-to-remove-over-600-000-videos-from-south-africans/{/URL}
{Author}Luis Monzon{/Author}
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