Here’s something potentially brow-raising, TikTok has announced that it’s expanding its state-affiliated labels, with profile indicators now set to be applied in 40 markets to any media outlets that TikTok assessed as being influenced by their local government. Given this context, this seems like a rather big example of deflection.

As TikTok explains:

“Last year, we began to pilot adding labels on content from state-controlled media, starting in Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. Our state-affiliated media policy is to label accounts run by entities whose editorial output or decision-making process is subject to control or influence by a government. Our goal in labeling state-affiliated media is to ensure people have accurate, transparent, and actionable context when they engage with content from media accounts that may present the viewpoint of a government.”

The State of TikTok

Especially right now, adding more transparency can only be beneficial for TikTok users. Given TikTok’s link to the Chinese Government, along with the ongoing speculation about the platform being used as a surveillance tool, the timing of this update couldn’t have been better.

Right now, the US Government is amid an assessment as to whether it should just flatten perma-ban TikTok, with security experts even calling on The White House to take action and restrict TikTok’s access. The app’s case hasn’t been helped by the fact that staff from its parent company, ByteDance, were recently discovered to be spying on several American journalists by using their TikTok profiles to identify where they had been and who they’ve been in contact with, which, ironically, is the very thing that TikTok has pledged that it doesn’t, and won’t ever, do.

Because of the increasing suspicions, organizations across the US continue to ban TikTok on their devices, as calls for the app’s full removal also increase. TikTok itself has reported that its long-running negotiations with US officials have also taken a hit, making its situation all the more precarious.

We can’t really call or consider TikTok to be ‘state-affiliated media’. While all Chinese apps are technically required to share information with the Chinese Government upon request, it’s interesting, at least in this broader context, to see TikTok running deflection, by flagging that it’s now going to better label state-associated media in the app. ‘For increased transparency’. It all seems like a desperate bid to boost trustworthiness, which only works to further discredit itself.

The Wrap

Don’t get us wrong, it’s a good update, it just seems rather finicky given the broader debate. TikTok says that it has worked with a range of media experts and academics to establish clear criteria for labeling state-affiliated media, but it will also add an appeals process for entities that believe that they’ve been incorrectly tagged by the marker. The bottom line: more transparency, better.

Sources

http://bit.ly/3wdhpLl