At a regular press conference on the afternoon of October 5, the Ministry of Information and Communications announced the results of a comprehensive inspection of TikTok's operations in Vietnam, including a number of prominent violations.
TikTok Singapore directly operates cross-border service provision into Vietnam
According to Mr. Le Quang Tu Do, Director of the Department of Radio, Television and Electronic Information (Ministry of Information and Communications), the activities of the TikTok platform have a significant impact on social life, including illegal acts, causing public outrage.
In order to strengthen management, promptly detect, correct and handle violations of this platform, from May 22, the Ministry of Information and Communications coordinated with relevant agencies to comprehensively inspect TikTok's operations in Vietnam. On September 29, the Ministry issued Inspection Conclusion No. 08/KL-BTTTT on this matter.
The results of the inspection and verification showed that there were outstanding violations, namely that the TikTok office and TikTok Vietnam Company did not directly participate in the management and provision of cross-border services into Vietnam through the TikTok.com website and TikTok application. The provision of cross-border services into Vietnam is directly managed and operated by TikTok Pte.Ltd (TikTok Singapore).
TikTok Pte. Ltd (TikTok Singapore) is not the subject of the inspection but is the unit that directly manages, operates, and provides cross-border services to Vietnam through the website TikTok.com and the TikTok application. Therefore, TikTok Singapore is the unit responsible for complying with the provisions of Vietnamese law in providing cross-border services to Vietnam.
Lots of harmful information for children
The inspection team identified a number of violations by TikTok Singapore in providing cross-border services to Vietnam, including:
Regarding the provision of social networking services and child protection: Storing information that violates Vietnamese law on CDN servers in Vietnam, such as fake information, distortion, inciting violence, inciting social evils; information that is harmful to children.
The content censorship process is ineffective, allowing many contents that violate Vietnamese law to pass through; the way of distributing and recommending content based on user interactions, preferences, and interests can easily lead to content that violates Vietnamese law being spread quickly if many users interact and are interested.
There are no measures or tools to ensure the safety of children's private information; no warning messages are sent when children provide or change their private information; no detection or removal of images, documents, or information that are inappropriate for children and affect their healthy development...
Regarding e-commerce service provision activities: Information about the application owner has not been published on the TikTok application homepage. Seller information has not been fully stored as required when registering to use the service; inspection and supervision have not been fully implemented to ensure the provision of information about the seller's goods on the e-commerce trading floor as required...
Propose to limit access time, do not allow children to earn money through TikTok
On that basis, the Inspection Team requested the TikTok office to take responsibility according to Vietnamese law for the provision of cross-border e-commerce trading floor services into Vietnam through the TikTok application.
Along with that, the Inspection Team recommended that the Ministry of Information and Communications take measures to force TikTok Singapore to immediately correct the violations.
Specifically: Remove 100% of content that violates Vietnamese law and have solutions to prevent content that has been blocked from being re-posted; add compliance with Vietnamese law to the Community Standards; periodically notify all TikTok users about compliance with Vietnamese law, strictly prohibit posting content that opposes the Party and State, violates Vietnamese law, and warn about sanctions and handling measures if users post or share content that violates the law.
Do not use algorithms to create trends or recommend to users content that violates Vietnamese law; completely ban political advertising with content that opposes the Party and State of Vietnam; coordinate in providing information to verify and investigate illegal acts carried out on the TikTok platform according to regulations.
Implement child protection measures as prescribed in Articles 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, Chapter IV on the responsibility to protect children in the online environment of Decree No. 56/2017/ND-CP dated May 9, 2017 of the Government detailing a number of articles of the Law on Children.
Pay special attention to verifying account information to detect cases where children declare incorrect age to use TikTok, delete accounts of children under 13 years old; limit access time and use of TikTok for people under 18 years old, do not allow children to earn money through TikTok...
TikTok needs to improve its content censorship system (especially for livestreaming) to proactively prevent infringing content. At the same time, it needs to have agreements with Vietnamese press agencies when cooperating to distribute and share content on the basis of Vietnamese law on copyright.
The inspection team requested the Ministry of Public Security to request TikTok Singapore to store Vietnamese users' data in accordance with regulations and authorize TikTok's legal entity in Vietnam to ensure information safety and security. Supervise TikTok Singapore's implementation of storing Vietnamese users' data. Coordinate closely with the Ministry of Information and Communications in detecting, preventing, and handling violations of the law on the TikTok platform in Vietnam.
"When establishing a legal entity in Vietnam, that company is not a shell company and must take real responsibility," Mr. Tu Do noted, adding that TikTok Singapore agrees with the inspection conclusions and commits to providing solutions within the next 30 days./.
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