Complying with the Peshawar High Court’s (PHC) orders, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) on Thursday directed the service providers to immediately block access to TikTok.
In a tweet, the authority said, “In respectful compliance to the orders of the Peshawar High Court, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority has issued directions to the service providers to immediately block access to the TikTok App.”
In an official statement, TikTok said that maintaining a safe and positive in-app environment is essential to the TikTok experience.
“We use a combination of technologies and moderation strategies to detect and review content that violates our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines (https://support.tiktok.com/ur/privacy-safety/community-policy-ur), and we implement penalties including removing videos and banning accounts when there are violations” it said.
The statement added, “Our H2 2020 Transparency Report showed that we aggressively and proactively take down inappropriate content in Pakistan. This highlights our commitment to complying with local laws.”
“In fact, we have enhanced moderation capabilities in Pakistan, with our local-language moderation team growing close to 250% since September,” it further stated.
“We are committed to continue working closely with the PTA to further strengthen our safeguards on behalf of our users, but we are also committed to ensuring our users’ rights to express themselves creatively on the platform, in line with our policies. We have faith that by working with the authorities to explain our policies and demonstrate our dedication to user security, we can arrive at a resolution that would allow TikTok to continue serving the millions of users in Pakistan who have found a home for creative expression on our platform” TikTok concluded.
Earlier in the day, the high court said that it was ordering the ban after a private complainant said the social media app was spreading indecent content, Jehanzeb Mehsud, told Reuters.
The telecom regulator had earlier blocked TikTok in October for failing to filter out “immoral and indecent” content, another blow to the social media app that has come under increasing scrutiny as its popularity has surged across the globe.
The step was taken in view of “complaints from different segments of the society against immoral and indecent content on the video-sharing application”, said the PTA through a notification.
The ban has subsequently lifted after the company vowed to block all accounts involved in spreading “obscenity and immorality”.
“TikTok has agreed to moderate accounts in accordance with local laws,” said a spokesman for the PTA, adding that the app had some 20 million monthly active users in the country.
TikTok remained the third most-downloaded app in Pakistan over the past 12 months, behind WhatsApp and Facebook, according to analytics firm SensorTower.
With additional input from Reuters
