TikTok denies ICE-content censorship, cites outage (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Some TikTok users have said they've been unable to post ICE-related content on the social network and are accusing the platform of censorship.

[00:00:08] Speaker 2: So I can't post anything about what happened yesterday in Minnesota.

[00:00:12] Speaker 1: The new majority American-owned joint venture managing TikTok's U.S. operations says any issues with posting and sharing content are because of a data center outage in the United States. The concerns come days after the group took control of TikTok's U.S. assets, including moderating its content. They also come after a federal agent or agents shot and killed ICU nurse Alex Pretty in Minneapolis on Saturday. A spokesperson for the TikTok U.S. joint venture said the tech issues were unrelated to that change in TikTok's U.S. management. It said on Tuesday that it's making significant progress in fixing its U.S. infrastructure, but that some U.S. users may still experience technical issues. Experts have said it would be difficult to prove whether TikTok is censoring content because we don't know what its content recommendation process is like. But even if it was, it would be within its legal right to do so because it's a private platform.

[00:01:02] Speaker 3: So this app wasn't letting anything get posted yesterday.

[00:01:06] Speaker 1: Although the accusations are only circumstantial, the issue has stirred up controversy. Connecticut Democratic Senator Chris Murphy called it a threat to democracy. An analysis firm, Censor Tower, told CNBC that daily average TikTok uninstalls are up nearly 150 percent in the last five days compared to the last three months.