“TikTok is one of the newest in the game, and it’s one of the hardest platforms, from a data collection standpoint, because their are not as rich as, say, Twitter or Facebook,” said David Hasman, who oversees data analysis at the International Criminal Court, which is one of several international institutions and countries that have launched human rights investigations in Ukraine. It comes as TikTok struggles to balance the swift removal of posts showing graphic violence or misleading content with the preservation of potential evidence for human rights trials. TikTok’s processes are just not developed, and they do not have it figured out,” said Kayyali, who met with TikTok earlier this year. “I haven’t gotten any follow-up and it’s very frustrating. TikTok says it no longer blocks content based on political sensitivities. TikTok has admitted it has censored content critical of China in the past, including references to Tiananmen Square, for instance. So far, China has refused to condemn Russia for invading Ukraine and backed Moscow’s complaints about NATO expansion. “It is especially concerning that China could directly have access to that data.”
I have concerns about the security of data there, and it is not fully clear where the interest and influence in the company is coming from,” said Dia Kayyali, associate director for advocacy at Mnemonic, a nonprofit that archives digital documentation of human rights violations. “There is a lot of suspicion of engaging with TikTok because of its origins, and I think rightfully so.
TikTok, owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance, has been criticized for being slow to respond to requests for product changes that allow the video app’s content to be archived and verified more easily, as well as better access to TikTok’s platform for members of civil society.
TIKTOK ARCHIVE ARCHIVE
The video app’s popularity with young Ukrainians and Russians posting footage of the war has made it a trove of digital intelligence that investigators are attempting to mine and archive as evidence of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and illegal acts of violence in Ukraine. TikTok is resisting calls to preserve and hand over access to its content for war crime investigations, as lawyers and activists warn that the Chinese-owned app is a major data challenge in prosecuting atrocities in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
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