TROUBLING

TikTok Says Suicide Video Was an Attack Masterminded on Dark Web

TikTok had trouble taking the video down and users advised others with warnings to swipe away from it.

TikTok said Tuesday that a troubling video of a man’s suicide that circulated on the platform was a “coordinated effort” from trolls on the dark web, according to CNN. The graphic video was originally shared on Facebook, and showed a man shoot himself with a gun. TikTok had trouble taking the video down because multiple users tried to flood the platform with it by editing the clip in different ways and re-uploading it. Users advised others to swipe away from the clip if they came across it. “Through our investigations, we learned that groups operating on the dark web made plans to raid social media platforms including TikTok, in order to spread the video across the internet,” director of government relations and public policy at TikTok Europe Theo Bertram said. “What we saw was a group of users who were repeatedly attempting to upload the video to our platform.”