Tiktok dismisses the moderation team from Germany and replaces it with AI / employees go on strike. Union: “They told us clearly: we don't want to talk to you”

Tiktok employees in Germany have been on strike, in protest against the mass dismissal of the team responsible for trusting and safety of the platform. The giant of social networks has announced that it intends to abolish the entire moderation team in Berlin, which deals with eliminating harmful content, and transferring this activity to artificial intelligence and contract -based workers. The measure would lead to the dismissal of 150 employees, according to The Guardian.

The union representing Tiktok employees, Ver.di, has tried in recent weeks to negotiate with the company. Kalle Kunkel, a spokesman for Ver.di for the Berlin-Brandenburg region, said the union has sent Tiktok a list of claims for compensation for the affected employees and the extension of the notice period to one year. According to him, so far Tiktok has refused to participate in negotiations.

“Basically, they told us:” We do not want to talk to you, “and after that we organized two strikes,” Kunkel said. “But it does not react now.”

Berlin employees serve the German -speaking market, which has about 32 million active users, according to the union. Tiktok has a few offices in Germany, but the headquarters in the Capital is the highest, with about 400 employees. The dismissal of the trusted and safety team would mean a reduction in staff by almost 40%.

Anna Sopel, a spokesman for Tiktok, said that the proposed availability aimed to “simplify workflows and improve efficiency” and that “we remain fully employees in protecting the safety and integrity of our platform.”

In Germany, as in other countries, the reliable and safety team has the role of ensuring that the short videos published on the platform do not contain harmful content and do not violate the company's rules. This involves identifying materials that include violence, pornography, misinformation or instigating speech. According to the union, the team members analyze up to 1,000 videos per day, and this human work is often done in combination with artificial intelligence systems.

The global tendency to replace moderators with artificial intelligence

In the last year, Tiktok has reduced the staff from the global reliable and safety teams, often replacing these employees with automated systems. In September, the company fired the entire team of 300 content moderators in the Netherlands. In October, Tiktok announced that it will replace about 500 Malaysian moderators with artificial intelligence -based moderation systems. In February this year, Reuters reported that Tiktok began to dismiss a significant part of the reliable and safety teams in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Germany dismissions come after, in 2024, CEO Tiktok, Shou Zi Chew, said, in front of the US Congress, that the company will increase the expenses for trusted and safety teams. He then committed to allocate over $ 2 billion for a team of over 40,000 people globally. Sopel, the spokesman, said that Tiktok is investing another $ 2 billion in this area, but has not answered questions about the current number of employees in these teams worldwide.

Tiktok, owned by the Chinese company byTedance, risks being banned in the United States if it is not sold to a buyer approved by the Government, but Donald Trump has given several delays of several months after applying the prohibition.

Other social media companies, including SNAP INC, X and Meta – Facebook and Instagram owner – have also reduced, in the last two years, reliable and safety teams. In May, the NPR revealed that Meta intends to replace 90% of the employees dealing with products with artificial intelligence systems, including those in the field of confidence and safety. Meta and X have also given up on information verification programs, replacing them with notes added by other users.

“Replacing people who have the role of ensuring that platforms are safe and respect the rights of all users, including minors, will lead to more mistakes and more harmful experiences,” said Aliya Bhatia, the main analyst of policies at the Non-Profit for Democracy and Technology organization, studying the automatic moderation.

Strikes and protests from replacing employees with artificial intelligence

The outsourcing of this activity to artificial intelligence is problematic, Kunkel said. Tiktok employees have complained to the union that the automatic moderation system of the company has classified videos with the rainbow flag of the PRIDI community as a harmful content, although they do not violate the platform policies. Instead, they have complained to the employees, the AI can overlook materials that are truly inappropriate.

“Artificial intelligence cannot truly identify problem images or videos, especially when it comes to sophisticated content,” Kunkel said.

The European Union has stricter rules than other regions of the world in terms of regulating technological platforms and moderation of content. Based on the act on digital services, adopted in 2022, social media companies, including Tiktok, are obliged to rigorously protect the platforms against harmful content, otherwise they risk consistent fines.