Bitten by bans, TikTok hires Pakistani content moderators, triples investment

KARACHI: After being repeatedly banned in Pakistan over content that local authorities say is “immoral,” Chinese video-sharing platform TikTok had increased the number of Pakistani content moderators by over 300 percent and tripled its investment in the South Asian country, a senior official said this week.
TikTok has been banned four times in Pakistan. The most recent ban by the country’s telecom regulator, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), was imposed in July 2021, and lifted in November 2021 “after assurances by the platform to control ‘immoral and unlawful’ content.”
In October, TikTok said it had removed over 9.85 million posts generated by Pakistani users between April and June for violating community guidelines, adding that the country ranked second in terms of the volume of removed content in the world.
“Understanding the gravity of the local laws, ethics and values, TikTok has invested heavily in its team of local-language content moderators, leading to a 300 percent-plus growth in local-language moderation headcount,” Jiagen Eep, Trust and Safety, Singapore Hub Lead for TikTok, told Arab News via email.
“This large content moderation team works round the clock, monitoring content posted by our users in Pakistan,” he said. “Of course, our moderators work within the purview of prevailing labor laws and additional offline time is provided for wellbeing and training.”
The official said keeping in mind the social, religious and cultural context of Pakistan, TikTok had “more than tripled our investment in the last twelve months in our dedicated local-language moderation team for Pakistan” that ensured that content on the platform was in line with community guidelines and prompt action was taken in case of violations.
“The content moderation process has been made even more efficient with the hiring of local-language moderators who understand multiple Pakistani languages, culture and social norms and are able to make quick assessments in light of our community guidelines,” he said.
Jiagen said 16,347,396 videos were removed between January and June 2021 for violating Pakistani community guidelines. This was only 1.5 percent of the total videos uploaded during that period, he said.
“Our efforts on content moderation in Pakistan have been acknowledged and commended both by the PTA and the Prime Minister’s Committee for Social Media Rules,” he said.
The platform, Jiagen said, took action over adult nudity and sexual activities, harassment and bullying, hateful behavior, illegal activities, integrity and authenticity, minor safety, suicide, self-harm and dangerous acts, violent extremism, and violent and graphic content.
To improve content creation in Pakistan, TikTok had also launched a digital literacy initiative and was planning a creators’ academy, Jiagen said.
“We are partnering with local NGOs to drive digital literacy initiatives in Pakistan, including introducing guides in local languages for parents and teachers along with awareness sessions for safe use of the Internet,” the platform said in response to questions emailed by Arab News.
“In the future, we also plan to launch the TikTok Creators Academy in Pakistan which is a program that offers a series of workshops to empower creators to develop and create compelling content and stories across multiple content categories on TikTok,” the statement said. “We are also working on some major projects that we hope to announce soon.”
Jiagen’s comments come just weeks after the Pakistani government approved new social media rules to regulate its cyberspace, including imposing a penalty of up to Rs500 million, or roughly $3 million, on service providers and social media companies in cases of statutory violations.
The rules, which have been under discussion since November last year, have invited fierce criticism from rights groups who fear they may be used to stifle dissent and free speech.

Bitten by bans, TikTok hires Pakistani content moderators, triples investment