TikTok Slammed for ‘Doing Nothing’ Over Pro-Anorexia Content
TikTok is failing to protect young users from dangerous content promoting eating disorders, according to a new report, despite being warned by researchers that the posts were receiving millions of views.
Late last year, a group of researchers at the Center For Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) warned TikTok they had found harmful pro-eating disorder content hidden under coded hashtags on the site—some of which had millions of views. Now, they say the company failed to remove the vast majority of the content.
“Every view represents a potential victim—someone whose mental health might be harmed by negative body image content, someone who might start restricting their diet to dangerously low levels,” said Imran Ahmed, CEO of the CCDH, in a statement. “The stakes are too high for TikTok to continue to do nothing, or for our politicians to sit back and fail to act.”