TikTok users are exposed to false information about the war in Ukraine within 40 minutes of viewing, according to a new investigation by NewsGuard.
Posted at 6:00 a.m.
Even if they are not looking for specific information on the conflict, TikTok users will be suggested truthful content and false information, without distinction between the two, on the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, details the survey conducted in March.
NewsGuard is a website where experienced journalists analyze news sites to assess their reliability. As part of this research, six analysts from different countries uninstalled and reinstalled TikTok, created new accounts and watched videos about the conflict in Ukraine continuously for 45 minutes.
In another part of the investigation, they also searched for specific words, such as “Ukraine” and “Donbass”.
In both cases, false information was disseminated, without wording to warn the user. A large proportion of TikTok users are under the age of 18, recalls NewsGuard.
A TikTok spokesperson responded to the British newspaper The Guardian that efforts had been made by the platform, since the start of the war in Ukraine, to “remove false information and help protect a safe experience on TikTok”.