Community Guidelines Enforcement Report
April 1, 2021 – June 30, 2021
Released: October 13, 2021
About this report
TikTok is where people around the world come to enjoy authentic and creative entertainment. We strive to foster a safe and inclusive experience for creators and viewers alike by taking action on content and accounts that violate our Community Guidelines.
This is our Community Guidelines Enforcement Report, which brings visibility to the content and accounts removed during the second quarter of 2021 (April-June) for violating our Community Guidelines. We’re also publishing additional insight into the volume of fake activity we stopped or removed in our effort to preserve authenticity on TikTok. In addition, this report now includes a breakdown of content removed before receiving any views.
Latest data
Videos
From April-June 2021, 81,518,334 videos were removed globally for violating our Community Guidelines or Terms of Service, which is less than 1% of all videos uploaded. Of those videos, we identified and removed 93.0% within 24 hours of being posted, 94.1% before a user reported them, and 87.5% at zero views. We also continued to roll out technology in additional markets that automatically detects and removes some categories of violative content. As a result, 16,957,950 of the total removals were handled through this technology.
This chart shows the five markets with the largest volumes of removed videos.
| Country/Market | Total removals |
| United States (US) | 11,431,198 |
| Pakistan (PK) | 9,851,404 |
| Brazil (BR) | 7,488,608 |
| Russia (RU) | 4,759,623 |
| Indonesia (ID) | 4,743,066 |
TikTok offers creators the ability to appeal their video’s removal and will reinstate content that’s been incorrectly removed. From April-June, 4,663,387 videos were reinstated after being appealed. We aim to be consistent and equitable in our moderation practices and strive to reduce false positives through ongoing policy trainings and quality checks.
The following chart shows the volume of videos removed by policy violation. Note that a video may violate multiple policies and each violation is reflected.
The following chart shows the rate at which videos were removed by policy reason. Proactive removal means identifying and removing a violative video before it’s reported to us. Removal within 24 hours means removing the video within 24 hours of it being posted on our platform. Removal at zero views means the video was removed after it was posted but before anyone viewed it.
| Proactive removal rate | Removal within 24 hours rate | Removal at zero views | |
| Adult nudity and sexual activities | 90.3% | 90.0% | 78.5% |
| Harassment and bullying | 73.3% | 83.8% | 61.4% |
| Hateful behavior | 72.9% | 80.8% | 60.6% |
| Illegal activities and regulated goods | 97.1% | 95.7% | 92.3% |
| Integrity and authenticity | 88.3% | 86.2% | 67.9% |
| Minor safety | 97.6% | 95.4% | 93.9% |
| Suicide, self-harm, and dangerous acts | 94.2% | 90.8% | 81.8% |
| Violent and graphic content | 94.9% | 94.3% | 86.6% |
| Violent extremism | 89.4% | 90.1% | 79.5% |
Adult nudity and sexual activities
Nudity, sexually explicit content, and pornography are not allowed on TikTok. Of the total videos removed, 14% violated this policy. 90% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 78.5% were removed at zero views, and 90.3% were removed before any reports.
Harassment and bullying
We aim to foster an inclusive community for creative self-expression and do not tolerate members of our community being shamed, bullied, or harassed. Of the total videos removed, 6.8% violated this policy. 83.8% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 61.4% were removed at zero views, and 73.3% were removed before any reports.
Hateful behavior
TikTok is a diverse and inclusive community that stands against hateful behavior, including hate speech and hateful ideologies. Of the total videos removed, 2.2% violated this policy. 80.8% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 60.6% were removed at zero views, and 72.9% were removed before any reports. This is a highly complex and nuanced area in which we must keep improving. We’re committed to bolstering our detection mechanisms for hate speech while improving our ability to correctly moderate counter speech and reappropriation.
Illegal activities and regulated goods
We work to ensure TikTok does not enable criminal activities or the promotion or trade of drugs, tobacco, alcohol, and other controlled substances or regulated goods. During the second quarter of this year, 20.9% of the videos removed violated this policy. 95.7% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 92.3% were removed at zero views, and 97.1%were removed before any reports.
Integrity and authenticity
We believe that trust forms the foundation of our community, and we do not allow content or accounts that involve fake engagement, impersonation, and harmful or dangerous misinformation. Of the videos removed, 0.8% violated this policy. 86.2% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted and 67.9% were removed at zero views. 88.3% were removed before any reports.
Minor safety
We are deeply committed to the safety of minors and regularly strengthen our processes to help keep minors safe. In the second quarter of 2021, 41.3% of content removed violated our minor safety policy. 95.4% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 93.9% were removed at zero views, and 97.6% were removed before any reports.
Suicide, self-harm, and dangerous acts
We care about the well-being of the individuals that make up our community and work to foster a supportive environment. Of the videos removed from April-June, 5.3% violated these policies. 90.8% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 81.8% were removed at zero views, and 94.2% were removed before any reports.
Violent and graphic content
TikTok is a platform that celebrates creativity but not shock-value or violence. Of the total videos removed,7.7% violated these policies. 94.3% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 86.6% were removed at zero views, and 94.9% were removed before any reports.
Violent extremism
TikTok strictly prohibits violent extremism and we take great care to prevent our platform from being used to threaten or incite violence. Of all videos removed, 1.1% violated this policy. 90.1% of these videos were removed within 24 hours of being posted, 79.5% were removed at zero views, and 89.4%were removed before any reports.
Accounts
In the second quarter of 2021, 14,871,412 accounts were removed for violating our Community Guidelines or Terms of Service. This includes 11,205,597 suspected underage accounts that were removed for potentially belonging to a person under the age of 13, which is less than 1% of all accounts on TikTok.
Fake activity
We continue to evolve and adapt our safeguards by investing in automated defenses to detect, block, and remove inauthentic accounts and engagement, and by improving our speed and response to evolving threats. From April-June, we stopped 148,759,987 fake accounts from being created. We also removed 8,542,037 videos posted by spam accounts.
We further identified and prevented 632,416,873 attempted follow requests by fake accounts and removed 71,935,583 fake accounts that followed other users. We also prevented 9,612,942,242 attempted likes and corrected 91,812,066 inauthentic likes by these accounts.
Ads
TikTok has strict policies to protect users from fake, fraudulent, or misleading advertising. Advertiser accounts and paid advertising are held to these policies and must follow our Community Guidelines, Advertising Guidelines, and Terms of Service. In the second quarter of 2021, we rejected 1,829,219 ads for violating advertising policies and guidelines. We are committed to building a positive, authentic, and joyful experience when it comes to seeing advertising on TikTok, and we will continue to invest in more people and technology to ensure advertising on our platform meets our standards.
Overview
Youth Safety
Well-being
At TikTok, we focus on people’s well-being so that our community can continue to grow, thrive, and amaze the world with its creativity. We always look for new ways to help nurture our community’s well-being, and in the second quarter of 2021, we have:
- Added new controls so that multiple comments can be deleted or reported at once, and accounts that post bullying or other negative comments can be blocked in bulk, up to 100 at a time.
- Published a Bullying Prevention guide to help families learn how to identify bullying as well as tools to counter bullying and provide help to bullying victims or bystanders.
- Launched #CreateKindness, a global campaign and a creative video series aimed at raising awareness about online bullying and encouraging people to choose to be kind toward one another.
- Encouraged our community to stand together with us against hate and to make the most of our safety tools, as part of our #SwipeOutHate campaign.
Yes
No