The social network TikTok has neutralized up to 15 different digital campaigns that sought to influence the political discourse of countries around the worldfrom the United States to Iran or Germany, passing through Latin American nations such as Venezuela, Ecuador or Guatemala, according to a report.
The document, the first of its kind published by the platform, exposes a wide variety of covert operations that tried to modify public opinion with content favorable to different governments or political parties.
These suspicious activities include a network that operated from China and targeted people in the US. with the intention of promoting «the politics and culture» of said country through 16 accounts with more than 110,000 followers in total.
«They created inauthentic accounts in order to artificially amplify pro-China narratives, including support for the political decisions and strategic objectives of the People’s Republic of China (PRC),» details the social network from this same country in its report. .
The TikTok report did not claim that the Chinese government was behind the influence operation.
The modus operandi used, also common in other cases, consisted of Open a series of profiles with fake creators and American celebrities to build your own audience.
This was the only attempt to condition TikTok users in the US, because it was detected another separate network with 65 accounts that sought to amplify pro-Iranian speeches through posts «related to travel and tourism to gain followers before turning to political topics» such as the war in Gaza, according to TikTok.
In addition, The Ukrainian War was also the reason for some of these operations of interference: 52 accounts with more than 2.6 million total followers that uploaded «pro-Ukrainian content and generated off-platform traffic to manipulate discourse» about the conflict were removed.
NETWORKS FROM CHILE
On the other hand, TikTok discovered two independent networks focused on Venezuela with a potential reach between both of more than 300,000 users.
The first, favorable to the Executive of Nicolás Maduro, attempted to «manipulate the discourse» on the territorial dispute with Guyana over the Essequibo area, highly rich in oil resources.
While the second, with a greater impact, It operated from Chile and also focused on «the Venezuelan diaspora» based in our country.alternating ‘posts’ about «the beauty of Venezuela with political content» favorable to «a Venezuelan opposition candidate», whose name was not revealed.
Recently, TikTok has been the subject of intense debate over its ownership and whether the Chinese government could use it to promote its political interests and even condition the upcoming US elections.
US President Joe Biden signed a bill last month that could ban TikTok nationwide if the app’s owners, the company ByteDance, do not sell it before 2025.
This, however, has filed a lawsuit to block the law, arguing a violation of freedom of expression protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.