Social media video platform TikTok restricted the reach of videos made by people living with disabilities. Affected by the restriction include people with facial disfigurement and people living with Down syndrome.
Netzpolitik.org after speaking with a source inside the company revealed that the policy was made to protect users with a high risk of bullying. This actually could be labeled discrimination, and the problem was compounded by moderators who needed to make snap decisions about users’ physical and mental traits.
TikTok’s strength lies in getting content promoted through TikTok’s algorithm. But Netzpolitik.org’s source alleges that TikTok made this difficult for people who might be bullied.
One risk category meant that videos only appeared in the country where they were uploaded. Another, known as “Auto R,” stopped videos from hitting other users’ “For You” feed after hitting a certain view count. This tag might be applied to individual videos, but for a couple of dozen “special users,” it was supposedly the default.
“Auto R” seemingly applied to a broad category of people. It could cover disabilities like the ones mentioned above, but Netzpolitik.org describes TikTok limiting the reach of “fat and self-confident” users, LGBT users, or users with autism — in other words, categories of people particularly likely to face abuse online. As the article notes, though, these categories could be difficult to judge simply from profiles or videos. And while the policy was meant to prevent bullying, it did so by punishing the likely victims.
A spokesperson from TikTok called the rules an early and flawed attempt to fight conflict. The spokesperson said that they were “never intended to be a long-term solution,” although the anonymous source said moderators were instructed to follow them as recently as September.
Another spokesperson told Verge,“Early on, in response to an increase in bullying on the app, we implemented a blunt and temporary policy.
“While the intention was good, the approach was wrong and we have long since changed the earlier policy in favor of more nuanced anti-bullying policies and in-app protections.”
