Communist Chinese government-tied TikTok proudly announced its extensive censorship in partnership with a leftist billionaire-tied entity during the ongoing Hamas-Israel war.
Communist Chinese government-tied TikTok bragged in a press statement that it had removed “over 500,000 videos and closed 8,000 livestreams in the impacted region for violating our guidelines.” The censorship came after Hamas’s horrific terror attack on Israel that has killed over 1,400 Israelis so far.
The popular video sharing app detailed various measures it is implementing to crush speech—or alleged “harmful misinformation”—even more, including a partnership with fact-checkers through Poynter’s International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN). The CCP has sided with the Palestinians in the current conflict.
Notably, Poynter has received funding from groups tied to leftist billionaires including: George Soros, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, as MRC Free Speech America has previously revealed. The leftist groups with ties to these billionaires gave the Poynter Institute at least $15,755,197 between 2007 and 2020. Given these connections, how can IFCN be an objective and trustworthy judge of “misinformation” on TikTok?
Even worse, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) owns a board seat and maintains a financial stake in TikTok’s parent company ByteDance. There are reports of Palestinians and the CCP forming a strategic alliance months ago. This is not surprising, considering the CCP’s consistent friendly attitude toward the Palestinians.
There’s one indication already of how subjective this TikTok censorship could be. Actor Nate Buzolic already alleged that TikTok censored his pro-Israel post uncovering Hamas atrocities. Buzolic told Fox News that TikTok accused him of spreading “false information,” taking down a video he shared of a child being kidnapped in Gaza.
TikTok’s announcement of its censorship crackdown vaguely referred to “acts of terror in Israel”—without identifying the perpetrators, let alone highlighting Hamas atrocities—and went right into mourning “the intensifying humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza.” It openly declared it had “mobilized significant resources and personnel” to help suppress content.
TikTok’s actions include a “command center,” more “moderators” (ie censors) and fact-checkers, temporary policy adjustments, law enforcement coordination, and enforcement of policies on “violence, hate, and harmful misinformation.” TikTok did not clarify all the details of how this massive censorship effort will work or what content is considered violative.
Conservatives are under attack. Contact TikTok via email at communitymanager@tiktok.com and demand Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment and provide transparency. If you have been censored, contact us at the Media Research Center contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.
