The report, from the Network Contagion Research Institute at Rutgers University, could raise new concerns about whether Beijing influences the content on the popular video app. Representative Josh Gottheimer, Democrat of New Jersey, said the report showed that TikTok was “a tool to brazenly spread disinformation and suppress content that undermines the Chinese government.”
Whoda thunk?
Well color me surprised
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Topics often suppressed by the Chinese government within its borders, including Tibet, Hong Kong protests and the Uyghur population, appear to be unusually underrepresented on TikTok compared with Instagram, according to a report published Thursday by online researchers.
The report, from the Network Contagion Research Institute at Rutgers University, analyzed the volume of posts with certain hashtags on TikTok and Instagram, which has hundreds of millions more users.
Representative Josh Gottheimer, Democrat of New Jersey, said the report showed that TikTok was “a tool to brazenly spread disinformation and suppress content that undermines the Chinese government.”
Mr. Finkelstein said that his group pursued its study after TikTok, in response to criticism about content related to the Israel-Hamas war, said hashtags like #FreePalestine were also more prevalent than #StandWithIsrael on Instagram and Facebook.
“Suggesting that this report employed TikTok’s methodology is false, and we have repeatedly made clear that comparing hashtags is an inaccurate reflection of on-platform activity,” he said.
Joshua Tucker, a co-director of the Center for Social Media and Politics at New York University, warned against drawing too firm of a conclusion from the institute’s report.
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