TikTok prohibits paid political advertisements on its app

TikTok has been under government, political parties and activists’ scanner for spreading fake pieces of information and sleazy content. The short-video app even faced a brief ban on the order of Madras High Court. Factoring in these concerns, TikTok had announced several initiatives to avoid such face-off.

Political parties and personalities had expressed their anger on TikTok for spreading misinformation in India and other countries. Propaganda run by political parties against each-other through advertisement is a major source of headache for the Bytedance-owned firm.

In a bid to alleviate that headache, TikTok has put a break on paid political ads on its app as they don’t fit into the experience it aspires to deliver to its 500 million user base.

According to Blake Chandlee, Vice President of TikTok's Global Business Solutions, TikTok won’t allow paid ads that promote or oppose a candidate, current leader, political party or group, or issue at the federal, state, or local level - including election-related ads, advocacy ads, or issue ads.

This is one of the major initiatives taken up by TikTok. Over the past few months, it has been running educational series with motivational speakers, tuition teachers and other role models of society. The app also introduced an age-gate feature to keep away users below the age of 13 from the platform.

Taking a strong stance on the issue of children protection from pornography content on the app, Madurai bench of Madras High Court had passed an interim order that directed to prohibit downloading of TikTok app effective from April 3. 

Previously, the union government had asked Chinese content apps that have more than 5 million users to set up a local office and appoint senior executive, who could be held responsible in India.

The development was reported by Reuters.