TikTok yanks antisemitic items from shop
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Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios
TikTok recently removed at least two articles of antisemitic gear from its TikTok Shop, a spokesperson confirmed to Axios.
Why it matters: As the company pushes further into commerce, its content moderation challenges will only expand.
State of play: One T-shirt featured the word "Jews" in bold red lettering above a picture of large nose in an ocean barreling up toward the water's surface — like a shark — with a dollar bill floating in the water.
- Another featured characters in Nazi uniforms that resembled those from the "Minecraft" video game with the word "Neinkraft" underneath.
Zoom in: The T-shirts, viewed by Axios on TikTok Shop before they were pulled, were available for at least a week.
- The accounts selling those items are still listed as active on TikTok Shop. A TikTok spokesperson clarified that accounts that violate certain policies aren't always automatically banned but rather receive strikes.
- They noted that TikTok does take active measures to remove potentially hateful or harmful goods from TikTok Shop, having rejected more than 50 million listings for potential policy violations between June and December 2024.
Yes, but: TikTok isn't alone. Any marketplace company will inevitably face the same sort of whack-a-mole challenge when it comes to content or listing moderation.
- Amazon, for example, has taken heat for antisemitic books on its platform. The e-commerce giant has a dedicated page explaining its approach to controversial products and content.
- Substack earlier this year apologized for an error that accidentally promoted a Nazi newsletter via a push notification.
Zoom out: TikTok is under enormous pressure to prove it can comply with U.S. safety and security laws. President Trump on Tuesday again postponed the implementation of a law that bans the app.
What to watch: The Trump administration said yesterday the U.S. and China had reached a framework for a deal to sell the app to an American tech giant, which would keep the app up and running in the U.S.
- Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Tuesday morning that the president's willingness to let TikTok go dark in the U.S. pushed China to make a deal.
- The deal would see a group of U.S. investors, including private equity giant Silver Lake, venture fund Andreessen Horowitz and Oracle — which currently works with TikTok to secure and host its data in the U.S. — control TikTok's U.S. business, per WSJ. Those U.S. investors would reportedly hold a roughly 80% stake in the U.S. app, and Chinese shareholders would own the rest.
