TikTok creates safety council, includes European Jewish industry leader

TikTok has created a safety council to advise it on content moderation policies and practices in Europe.

On the video platform’s new European Safety Advisory Council will be nine industry leaders, including Robin Sclafani, director at ‘A Jewish Contribution to an Inclusive Europe’ (CEJI).

Robin told Jewish News he is “honoured” with the appointment, saying: “It is great that TikTok has learned from the experiences of other platforms and is putting into place regional advisory councils so early in its lifetime. Through regular civil society consultation mechanisms, TikTok is building an infrastructure to provide a social platform that is safe and inclusive for people of all backgrounds.”

CEJI works to fight discrimination through anti-bias education and training programmes, as well as hate crime monitoring, response and prevention.

The council will be tasked with advising the platform around existing and emerging issues that may impact TikTok’s users, the company said, and to advise on how to approach content moderation.

This comes as Government’s Online Harms Bill, which will introduce stricter regulation for tech firms with harsh penalties for failing to protect users, is expected before Parliament later this year.

Some platforms have attempted to make their own efforts to improve self-regulation. Last year Facebook announced the creation of an independent Oversight Board to deliberate on content moderation decisions made by the social network, and marked Holocaust Memorial Day by launching a comprehensive educational resource.

TikTok announced it had made changes to its app, so users searching for terms relating to the Shoah would be redirected to educational information.