Panorama 2020 E42
Panorama 2020 E42
Transcript
00:00It's the social media sensation of lockdown, targeted at teens.
00:06I spend a lot of time doing the dances.
00:08I'd say I'm addicted to TikTok.
00:11It says its mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy.
00:16And though it clearly can, could TikTok also be putting some users at risk?
00:22If you're looking at a lot of kids dancing sexually and you interact with that,
00:26it's going to give you more kids dancing sexually.
00:30Predators unfortunately know where the children are hanging out.
00:33They know that that's where they can interact with them.
00:36Tonight on Panorama, we investigate how the app can expose children to harm.
00:41Some of the stuff I've seen on there makes your hair go white.
00:45It's a completely inappropriate environment for children.
00:48And ask, how safe is TikTok?
00:51He is saying he wants to show you a body part.
00:55He thinks you're 14. He's 34. That's not OK.
01:00Panorama
01:113, 2, 1.
01:16This is a new generation of celebrities.
01:19Known as Bite Squad, they moved into this house at the start of lockdown.
01:24It's run by their management company.
01:27They spend their days making videos like this one,
01:30dancing to the latest viral music trends, and then they post them to TikTok.
01:34You need to put hashtags in, and then you just post it.
01:41They get more than 70 million views a week,
01:44though if you're over 25, you may not have heard of them,
01:48because many of their viewers are still at school.
01:52We normally post from like 4 until 10,
01:54because, like, on a school day, they come home at like 4ish,
01:57they're on their phones, so we just catch them then to get better engagement.
02:01Today, we had 2.3 million views in total.
02:06The more views they get,
02:09the more money they can make through product promotion deals.
02:13Just how quickly has TikTok changed your lives?
02:16One video can really just set you off and suddenly make you this known person.
02:20You can just blow up randomly. That's what happened to me anyway.
02:23It's so unpredictable. Yeah.
02:25Like, sometimes you can put, like, the bare minimum in,
02:28have a bit of laugh, and it goes viral
02:31more than any of your other videos you've ever done.
02:35Fight Squad are influencers.
02:38Their fans don't just watch their videos, they copy them.
02:42A lot of what they post is upbeat, feel-good content.
02:46I'm bored again, so I'm going to be dyeing my hair.
02:48I'm bored again and I'm probably going to be dyeing my hair.
02:50I got bored again and I dyed my hair.
02:52Pranks, dances and body positivity videos.
02:58TikTok makes it easy for anyone to upload their own videos,
03:02from the elderly residents of a care home in Yorkshire
03:05to A-list celebrities.
03:10On TikTok, dance crazes can spread around the world,
03:13sometimes in hours.
03:15The app now has over 700 million users,
03:18including one in four Brits.
03:20Hey, TikTok.
03:21It's become the fastest-growing social media platform of all time.
03:27And has brought huge success to TikTok's Chinese owner.
03:31Bike Dance, headquartered in Beijing,
03:33is thought to have made more than £2bn in profit last year.
03:37And its 37-year-old founder, Chang'e Ming,
03:40is reportedly now the 10th richest man in China.
03:45Earlier this year, TikTok targeted the UK with its first ever TV ad,
03:49selling itself as a place where dreams come true.
04:0016-year-old Tash Werblow is one of the many teens
04:03who've bought into that dream.
04:07She films herself copying dance trends to songs like this.
04:11I'd say I'm addicted to TikTok.
04:14I spend between two to four hours a day
04:18during the pandemic, however,
04:20I spent between seven to eight hours, which is a lot.
04:24Do you think you're on it too much?
04:26Yes, definitely.
04:28How does it draw you in?
04:30You just keep on scrolling,
04:31like, you just lose track of time whilst you're on there.
04:34You could be on there just scrolling and scrolling.
04:37And I spend a lot of time, like, doing the dances.
04:39How does your mum feel about you being on TikTok?
04:41She doesn't really know much about it, I guess.
04:44She just knows it's really just like a form of social media
04:47and I think she's fine with it.
04:49Like some of the most popular TikTok trends...
04:55..this dance is based on a sexually explicit song.
04:59This version, that went viral, had the explicit language removed,
05:03but the song it's based on describes sexual acts in graphic detail.
05:10And the dance moves make the meaning clear.
05:14I wonder what Tash's mum, Sue,
05:16thought about the song her daughter was performing.
05:19Sue, can I ask you to take a look at these lyrics and read them out?
05:25Oh, God!
05:27Do you even want to say it? Not really.
05:30Gosh, this sounds awful.
05:32Dance on the... Now you've been served.
05:35I like a... With a little bit of curve.
05:38Hit this... With an upper cut.
05:42Call that... Captain Hook.
05:46No. Tash, are you familiar with those lyrics?
05:49It was a popular song at one point on TikTok.
05:53Did you copy it?
05:55I think I did, but I obviously didn't say any of the words.
05:59I just did the dance.
06:01So you didn't mouth the words? No, of course not.
06:04Many parents think it's harmless fun.
06:06What's your impression now?
06:09Sorry, you can't go on TikTok any more.
06:12My impression before was that TikTok was a fun thing,
06:16but now I think it's not what I thought it was.
06:21TikTok says it has a family pairing feature
06:24that allows parents who have accounts of their own
06:27to link them to their child,
06:29a restricted mode to limit the appearance of inappropriate content
06:33and a function to manage screen time.
06:36But Sue's reluctant to monitor everything her daughter does online.
06:40As they get older, it's very difficult to hold them back,
06:44because if you hold them back, they'll probably do it behind your back.
06:47I trust Tash and I'm hoping that she is mature enough
06:51that if anything bad that she didn't like,
06:54she wouldn't get involved in it.
06:56TikTok says you have to be 13 or over to use the app.
07:00It asks for your birthday when you sign up, but not for proof of age.
07:04That's standard across social media platforms.
07:07But in the UK, a study shows almost half of 8- to 12-year-olds use the app.
07:12And although TikTok says you can set your account to private,
07:16it didn't take me long to find hundreds of videos
07:19of extremely young children dancing and lip-syncing
07:22to explicit songs like these.
07:24MUSIC PLAYS
07:26MUSIC CONTINUES
07:40TikTok says it doesn't tolerate sexually suggestive content
07:44involving a minor and removes it from the app.
07:47But how are children finding the videos they copy in the first place?
07:52Well, it seems they don't have to look very far.
07:55What makes TikTok different to most other social media platforms
07:59is the way it suggests what to watch.
08:01When you open the app, you're greeted by this.
08:04It's called the For You page.
08:06Every time you swipe, you're shown a new post.
08:09But these aren't just from people you know and follow.
08:12When you register, TikTok asks you what you're interested in,
08:16then starts monitoring your activity on the app
08:18to work out what videos to show you.
08:21It even spots how long you linger on a clip
08:24and sends you more of the same.
08:26The system is driven by an algorithm
08:28that uses powerful artificial intelligence, or AI.
08:32I want to get to grips with how it works,
08:34so I've set up a TikTok account as a young user.
08:37All I have to do is give my name, age and an email or phone number.
08:43I'm pretending I'm 13 years old.
08:46This account's been set up on a new phone.
08:48I haven't given the algorithm anything at all,
08:50so I haven't searched for anything, haven't liked anything,
08:53haven't followed anyone.
08:55After ten minutes of swiping, I came across the first disturbing clip,
08:59a pig falling off a truck.
09:01I allowed the video to play through several times,
09:03then carried on swiping.
09:05Shortly afterwards, the app showed me this clip
09:07of a confrontation in the street.
09:10Again, I lingered on the video, but didn't press like.
09:13Before long, I was being fed a stream of videos
09:16of people screaming profanities.
09:18A violent assault.
09:20A husband threatening to attack his wife.
09:25And a young man lying bloodied in the street.
09:28I've spent 20 minutes swiping, and the algorithm's feeding me
09:32violent, angry, increasingly upsetting content.
09:36And TikTok thinks I'm 13.
09:39TikTok says its self-declaration of age during the sign-up process
09:43is in line with the industry standard.
09:46And if it determines that someone under 13 is using the platform,
09:50it terminates their account.
09:52It says the suggestion that TikTok deliberately serves harmful content
09:56to users via its algorithm is patently false,
09:59and that maintaining their safety and wellbeing is a top priority.
10:04Guillaume Chalot helped design a recommendation system for YouTube
10:08and is an artificial intelligence expert.
10:11The algorithm that drives TikTok looks at the watch history
10:15of every single kid,
10:18and then learns what video is the most likely to get you hooked.
10:23The AI is very powerful at deciding what to show next.
10:30And how does TikTok's algorithm differ to other social media platforms?
10:36One particular difference is that the videos are much shorter.
10:40So the AI has a lot more data to learn.
10:43So the artificial intelligence of TikTok
10:46is more powerful in a way than other platforms
10:50because it can learn faster about you.
10:53What's wrong with having an algorithm giving you personalized content?
10:58The AI can push some harmful content.
11:01You look at one video, and then it recommends a similar video,
11:05and then the algorithm recommends again this type of content.
11:10Sometimes parents think it's the fault of the kid
11:13or it's their fault because they were bad parents.
11:16But really they're competing against a super powerful
11:20artificial intelligence, and they're losing.
11:23TikTok says it's set out publicly how its algorithm operates
11:27and allows outside experts to review it.
11:30It says it has a number of features which allow users to indicate
11:33when they're not interested in content
11:35or want to block certain content creators.
11:38It says it deliberately pushes videos that users might not be interested in
11:42to bring a diverse range of content to the For You pages.
11:46Once TikTok's algorithm puts a video on the For You page,
11:50it can result in it reaching a huge audience.
11:53That can mean a rapid rise to fame for its young stars
11:56like 17-year-old Maya Carter.
11:58Hi, guys, so today I'm going to show you how I put on my lashes.
12:01Let's go.
12:03And then I cover it so I don't do a transition.
12:06OK, so what you're going to do is grab your best lashes,
12:09grab your best glue and apply it to the lash.
12:12So a 60-second video could take you how long?
12:16About two, three hours to make.
12:18Press post.
12:20Maya became famous on TikTok during lockdown last spring
12:24by posting a mixture of make-up tutorials and body positivity videos.
12:28I have struggled with my weight all my life.
12:31I gain and I lose, I gain and I lose.
12:35She's received more than eight million likes,
12:38but it's come at a cost.
12:40There was, oh, you're fat, your nose is huge,
12:43oh, why does your belly look like that?
12:45I'll show you.
12:47It's disgusting, to be honest.
12:55In numerous comments, Maya's targeted with abuse.
12:59What kind of impact has it had on you and your mental health?
13:02I went through a very dark phase when I received those comments at first.
13:07I was very, very depressed.
13:09TikTok says it takes safety incredibly seriously
13:13and is sorry this user has had a negative experience.
13:16TikTok has published its own community guidelines
13:19setting out what is and isn't allowed.
13:22It says it doesn't tolerate bullying,
13:24encourages users to report harassment
13:26and promises it will ban anyone for severe or repeated violations.
13:31I spoke to a former content moderator
13:34who worked at TikTok's London office last year.
13:37He was part of a team tasked with making sure users followed the guidelines.
13:42He says when he was working there,
13:44employees at TikTok's Chinese headquarters made all the key decisions.
13:48He's asked us to hide his identity.
13:51Did you see online bullying?
13:53Quite a bit, yeah.
13:55It felt like not very much was being done to protect people.
13:58Beijing were hesitant to suspend accounts
14:00or take stronger action on users who were being abusive.
14:03They would pretty much only ever get a temporary ban of some form,
14:06like a week or something.
14:08Moderators, at least on the team I was on,
14:10did not have the ability to ban accounts.
14:12They have to ask Beijing to do that.
14:14There were a lot of sort of clashes with Beijing.
14:17What would those clashes be over?
14:19Usually policy concerns or things
14:21that should have been taken more seriously than they were.
14:23Why do you think that was the case?
14:26I don't want to drive users away, even if that user is doing bad things.
14:29I think they would rather have the growth
14:31than taking out someone who is causing other community members distress.
14:36In March, TikTok announced it would be transitioning away
14:39from using moderation staff based in Beijing
14:42and that no content is moderated in China.
14:45It's told Panorama it invests heavily in automated moderation.
14:49It has an ever-growing expert team
14:51of more than 10,000 moderators in 20 countries
14:54who review and take action against content and accounts
14:57that violate its policies
14:59and that a team in Dublin now drives its safety strategy,
15:02decision-making and enforcement.
15:07Amber Driscoll has made a career on social media.
15:10She mostly uses Instagram,
15:12where she promotes body confidence to her 300,000 followers.
15:16When she joined TikTok, she too became concerned
15:19that harmful material wasn't being taken down.
15:23When did you first start using TikTok?
15:25I actually downloaded it in March when lockdown happened,
15:28as I think lots of people did.
15:30And I was shocked, honestly.
15:32Like, there was this huge obsession with weight loss.
15:36For years, Amber says she struggled with an eating disorder
15:39that was made worse by reading about weight loss
15:42and comparing herself to other women on social media.
15:46So she was alarmed to find her TikTok For You page
15:49filling up with videos objectifying young women,
15:52recommending crashed diets and promoting weight-loss pills.
15:56It's just what the algorithm thinks you like.
15:58It's obviously very clever.
16:00They want you to spend more time on the app,
16:02so then they just give you the videos that you clearly are enjoying
16:05or spending more time engaging with.
16:07You're not necessarily looking for it,
16:10but it's still going to somehow find you, almost.
16:13And you have all these teenagers posting these videos
16:16and then other teenagers seeing these
16:19and then either feeling shame for how much food they're eating
16:22or feeling that's what I should be doing,
16:24like, well, I can eat less than them kind of thing.
16:27Amber was so concerned,
16:29she made a TikTok video of her own criticising the app.
16:33It got the moderator's attention, but not in the way she'd hoped.
16:37I basically said,
16:38this app is promoting toxic behaviours and it needs to stop.
16:42So I posted that and it blew up and got over a million views
16:45and then it got deleted for violating community guidelines.
16:48TikTok deleted it for violating community guidelines?
16:52Yeah, even though obviously there are so many much, like,
16:55actually harmful TikToks that are encouraging harmful behaviours
16:58that don't get deleted.
17:00Why do you think it got deleted?
17:02Well, because I said this app is promoting eating disorders.
17:07TikTok says any content or account
17:10that seeks to promote or glorify eating disorders
17:13is a violation of the guidelines and will be removed.
17:16It says criticism is not a violation
17:19and would not be grounds for removal.
17:21If a user feels their content has been removed incorrectly,
17:24it says it encourages them to appeal.
17:28TikTok says it has built-in protections
17:30that make it impossible to search for keywords
17:33that would lead to harmful content.
17:35So if, for example, a user types in the word suicide,
17:38they're directed to the Samaritan's support line for help.
17:43But TikTok's search bar also has an auto-suggest function
17:46which offers up popular terms as you type.
17:49Panorama discovered that if a user starts typing certain banned keywords,
17:53the app itself can suggest alternative spellings.
17:56These might then lead to videos showing harmful content.
18:00Circumventing TikTok's own ban.
18:05TikTok says since receiving Panorama's findings,
18:08it's carried out an update of its search terms
18:10and will be adding hundreds of new ones
18:12that will no longer return search results.
18:15It says it will continue to aggressively update its list
18:18over the next few weeks.
18:22The former moderator says when he was working there,
18:25the algorithm driving TikTok could put its young users in harm's way.
18:30The algorithm will feed you what you interact with.
18:32So if you're looking at adults dancing,
18:34you're going to get more adults dancing.
18:36If you're looking at a lot of kids dancing sexually
18:38and you interact with that,
18:40it's going to give you more kids dancing sexually.
18:42Most users are not going to be interacting with bad content
18:45because that's not what they're into.
18:47Some users interact with that stuff because it is their interest.
18:50Maybe it's a predator.
18:51They see these kids doing that
18:52and that's their way of, you know, engaging with the kids.
18:57Panorama set up another fictitious account,
19:00this time in the guise of a 36-year-old man.
19:03We used a computer-generated photo.
19:07Whenever presented with an image of a young girl in school uniform,
19:11the man watched it to the end and pressed like.
19:17Within half an hour,
19:19his For You page was filled with images of school-age teens.
19:25Here's a video showing a young girl in class,
19:28on the floor, in her school uniform.
19:31It's attracted hundreds of comments, mainly from much older men.
19:35One's asking her to do a handstand,
19:37others are asking to see up her skirt,
19:39and there's also a reference to a sexual position.
19:43We found hundreds of comments like these across TikTok.
19:49After Panorama shared its findings with TikTok,
19:51it said this behaviour is unacceptable.
19:54Five accounts have been permanently banned
19:57and the devices used have also been banned from creating new accounts.
20:01It says it will not catch every instance of inappropriate content
20:05and account behaviour,
20:07but it's constantly strengthening processes to keep users safe.
20:12If adults are writing comments like these in public,
20:15what are they saying to young people in private?
20:18The former moderator says when he worked at TikTok,
20:21his team reviewed between 60 and 100 direct messages a day,
20:25reported by users.
20:27Some looked like attempts to groom young people.
20:30It would usually be an adult contacting a teenager.
20:33Sometimes it would just be slightly creepy questions,
20:36but the intent is obvious.
20:38Sometimes it would be slightly more subtle,
20:40like someone acting like a kid. That was less common, though.
20:43If you're seeing messages in your day,
20:45private messages that were clearly online grooming,
20:48then there must be so many more that aren't reported.
20:52Yeah.
20:55Since April, only accounts registered to users aged 16 or over
20:59can send or receive direct messages.
21:02But what if children lie about their age?
21:07We decided to test the app.
21:11This is our newest team member,
21:13a journalism graduate who creates TikToks for an internet search company.
21:18She's 23 but is posing as a 14-year-old.
21:22To make her look the part,
21:24we ran her pictures through photo-editing software.
21:29Every day, she posted videos copying popular dances to tracks like this.
21:34I would just try to post as regularly as possible,
21:37like a 14-year-old would.
21:40Really harmless, innocent videos.
21:45For three weeks, she took part in all the trends popular
21:48with TikTok's youngest users.
21:50I didn't do any of the explicit dancing or anything.
21:54I used hashtags like hashtag school life, hashtag school uniform.
21:58Talk me through the response you got.
22:00After about a week or so,
22:02I got followed by a profile picture just of a naked torso.
22:07That was the first strange thing.
22:09Then the videos were picking up more views
22:12and more people were following the account.
22:14Many appeared to be older men.
22:17And there's another one here.
22:19A man approached me, saying he was 21,
22:22and I said, I'm 14.
22:25And he kept continuing the conversation with me.
22:28He also continued to like loads of the videos and stuff like that.
22:31What was his profile like?
22:33A lot of the accounts he followed were mostly young girls.
22:36I saw that there was one as young as seven there.
22:38And it was just strange to think
22:40that this is what they're using TikTok for.
22:43The messages soon became much more disturbing.
22:46One morning, I woke up to a message on the account.
22:50OK, that is completely inappropriate.
22:54The guy's 34.
22:56He is saying he wants to show you a body part.
23:01He thinks you're 14. He's 34. That's not OK.
23:04No. That's sickening. Yeah.
23:07TikTok's community guidelines say it's deeply committed to child safety,
23:11has zero tolerance for predatory behaviour
23:14and bans users from engaging minors
23:16in sexually explicit conversation.
23:19So would TikTok take action against this account?
23:26Our teenager reported the user and each of the messages he sent.
23:32It took four days for action to be taken,
23:35and that was only after Panorama contacted TikTok
23:38with the details of our investigation.
23:42TikTok says a report about a user's account or comments
23:45will not generally trigger a review of direct messages.
23:49It says on this occasion the report was against the account in general,
23:53not the specific direct messages,
23:55and because the account posted no videos, no action was taken.
24:00As a result of Panorama's investigation,
24:02it says two accounts and the devices used to set them up
24:05have been permanently banned.
24:07Lauren Lefebvre runs a child safety campaign.
24:10Her 14-year-old son, Breck, was groomed and murdered
24:13by a man he'd met while playing computer games online.
24:17I don't think parents are aware of the numbers of children
24:20that are groomed online,
24:22and I don't think that they believe it will ever happen to them.
24:25The thing with TikTok is it's fun,
24:28and I think whenever someone is having fun,
24:31they're not being targeted.
24:33And I think whenever someone is having fun,
24:36they're not recognising the dangers,
24:38and I think it's really important that we recognise
24:41that not everyone is there for the same reasons,
24:44and they might be looking to groom a child, to exploit them,
24:47to get them to do something that could be harmful to them.
24:50Do you think TikTok's safe?
24:52Nowhere is safe for children online.
24:55Our goal is to make it safer, but nowhere is safe,
25:00and TikTok is too interactive, too much fun, too creative,
25:06and predators, unfortunately, know where to go.
25:09They know where the children are hanging out.
25:12They know that that's where they can interact with them.
25:16Legislation to make the internet safer was promised three years ago.
25:20Boris Johnson says he wants an independent regulator,
25:23but the plans have been delayed by coronavirus.
25:26We still don't know when the bill
25:28is going to be brought to Parliament.
25:30We were told it was going to be before the end of this year.
25:33Now it might be the beginning of next year.
25:35Where does TikTok sit on the danger scale
25:37when compared to other social networks, for example?
25:41It's numero uno in my book at the moment.
25:43Some of the stuff I've seen on there makes your hair go white.
25:47It's a completely inappropriate environment for children.
25:52The government says children will be at the heart
25:55of its new online harm laws,
25:57with platforms such as TikTok subject to a legal duty of care
26:01to protect young people from harm.
26:03It says it will publish legislation next year
26:05so that the era of self-regulation is over
26:08with tough sanctions for online companies.
26:11What would you say to parents whose children are on TikTok?
26:15If your child is under 13, do not give them a mobile device.
26:19If your child's over 13, be involved with them.
26:22Don't let them go twerking for strangers' entertainment.
26:25That's just going to end badly,
26:26and TikTok is not going to parent your kids for you,
26:29and they're not going to protect them the same way that you would.
26:55Microsoft Mechanics
26:56www.microsoft.com
26:58www.microsoft.com
27:00www.microsoft.com