China govt asked TikTok for stealth propaganda account, says report

A Chinese government entity responsible for public relations attempted to open a stealth account on TikTok targeting Western audiences with propaganda, according to internal messages seen by Bloomberg.

The attempt, which met with push-back from TikTok executives, highlights the internal tensions within the fast-growing social media app, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance Inc., which has constantly attempted to distance itself from Chinese state influence.
 

In an April 2020 message addressed to Elizabeth Kanter, TikTok’s head of government relations for the UK, Ireland, Netherlands and Israel, a colleague flagged a “Chinese government entity that’s interested in joining TikTok but would not want to be openly seen as a government account as the main purpose is for promoting content that showcase the best side of China (some sort of propaganda).”
 

The messages indicate that some of ByteDance’s most senior government relations team, including Kanter and US-based Erich Andersen, Global Head of Corporate Affairs and General Counsel, discussed the matter internally but pushed back on the request, which they described as “sensitive.” TikTok used the incident to spark an internal discussion about other sensitive requests, the messages state.
 

“We declined to offer support for this request, as we believed the creation of such an account would violate our Community Guidelines,” said a TikTok spokeswoman, who downplayed the incident as an informal request from a friend of an employee.

TikTok has rules against “coordinated inauthentic behavior,” where accounts conceal their true identity to exert influence or sway public opinion, and against political advertising, the spokeswoman said. 
 

TikTok does allow some Chinese government entities, including the Chinese embassy in the US, to have verified accounts. The company is planning to expand its state-controlled media policy, which labels state-run accounts, in the “coming months” to include other government entities, the spokeswoman added. 
 

Kanter and Andersen declined to comment. The Chinese government did not respond to a request for comment. 

The messages have emerged in the same week that UK foreign secretary Liz Truss pledged to crack down on Chinese-owned firms.