Justin Ehrlich, Global Head of Policy and Partnerships, Trust and Security
At TikTok, we want to provide our community with the context and tools to evaluate content on our platform. For example, labels are added to videos with inappropriate content. Blue checkmarks on accounts help viewers understand that the owner of the account is who they say they are. Last year, we started adding labels to content from state media, starting with Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. Today we are expanding our global public media policy and labels to help viewers better understand content sources.
Our approach to state media
Our government media policy is to flag the accounts of organizations whose editorial production or decision-making is controlled or influenced by the government. Our goal in labeling government media is to provide people with an accurate, transparent, and actionable context when they interact with content from media accounts that may represent the government’s point of view. Last year, we launched our public media pilot project and met with over 60 media experts, political scientists, academics, and representatives of international organizations and civil society from the Americas, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and Australia. We also consulted with our content and security advisory boards and worked closely with the world’s leading media monitor to develop an independently verified methodology to guide our labeling decisions for government-related media.
The information we received from these stakeholders highlighted the importance of taking into account the different political, legal and cultural contexts associated with the media. In addition, we have received feedback that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to government media, and supporting user education about the various ways governments seek to influence news and reporting is becoming increasingly important. Based on this data, our policy considers state-controlled media, which we define as organizations in which there is evidence of strong editorial control and decision-making by state representatives.
How we evaluate editorial independence from states
When evaluating editorial independence, we consider the organization’s mission, editorial practices and security measures, leadership and editorial management, and its actual editorial decisions. We also apply additional due diligence to entities that may be heavily dependent on government funding, either directly or through advertising, loans and subsidies. Some of the questions we ask when categorizing include:
- Is editorial independence part of the organization’s mission statement?
- Does the organization have a set of guidelines regarding standards of journalistic conduct?
- Are there government representatives in leadership or editorial leadership positions?
- Has the organization transparently disclosed any nationality?
- Is there evidence that media outlets are not following their editorial guidelines?
- How has the organization dealt with matters of significant public interest to the government?
Based on our score, we then classify the entity and apply a label to the account profile and their content.
Expansion of our state-controlled media label
We are moving beyond our pilot project and will begin rolling out our state-owned media label in stages, starting in over 40 markets across multiple regions. Over time, we will continue to promote this label in even more markets.
Providing an opportunity to appeal
We have spent months developing an unbiased methodology that can be consistently applied by our trust and safety team that oversees labeling decisions for state media. At the same time, knowing that there is always a need for an element of context that can lead to occasional errors, we are also introducing an appeals process for organizations that feel they have been incorrectly labeled as state-controlled media. To file an appeal, an organization may submit additional information to indicate safeguards to ensure editorial independence. We will evaluate the evidence provided, solicit information from independent opinion leaders, and remove the label if we find that an organization does not meet our public media criteria.
We will continue to look at additional ways to deliver context to viewers on TikTok.
