Social media company TikTok has moved to defend its record on removing harmful content from its platform following the deaths of five teenagers in a crash on the M9 motorway on Sunday.
Media regulator Coimisiún na Meán has contacted TikTok to determine how it is responding to footage of joyriding and dangerous driving on its platform.
The head of the regulator said it is “generally concerned about the glorification of dangerous activity” and a range of “harmful content” being available on social media.
Greater attention is being paid to videos showing car robberies and illegal driving on social media after five teenage boys, who were travelling in a BMW in the wrong direction on the M9 motorway near Moone, Co Kildare, were killed in a head-on crash with another car in the early hours of Sunday morning.
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Three women and a child in the other car, who were on their way to Dublin Airport, remain in hospital with serious injuries.
“We have been in touch with TikTok. We have asked them for a full account of what they have seen on their platform, how they have dealt with it,” the commission’s executive chairman Jeremy Godfrey said during an appearance on RTÉ News at One on Tuesday.
An initial response from the social media giant is expected on Tuesday, with the commission to assess the response from the platform and whether it is in breach of its responsibilities.
“If they are, we can take things further with investigations and enforcement actions,” he said, but refused to comment on whether the company is actively in breach.
TikTok on Tuesday moved to defend its record in removing harmful content. It said it was “closely monitoring content related to this incident”, and would remove videos and accounts that broke its rules.
The platform said it removes content that glorifies violence, or promotes crimes that could harm people.
It has also clamped down on viral challenges in recent years, removing videos that feature activities the platform deems likely to be imitated and could cause significant physical harm. That includes risky driving.
The platform uses a mix of automated systems and human moderators to police content on its platform. The company said 99.1 per cent of content it removed in the first three months of the year for violating policies on violent and criminal behaviour was taken down before it was reported to TikTok.
The Irish Times examined a sample of the TikTok accounts that had been actively posting video footage of joyriding on Monday, the majority of which have since been banned by the platform. However, new videos of car thefts have been posted since the incident on Sunday.
Meta’s policies also restrict users under 18 on Instagram from seeing content deemed “unsuitable”, including imagery that shows dangerous forms of driving that could lead to life-threatening injuries or death unless it is shared in fictional or professional settings.
Promoting or encouraging people to take part in viral challenges that are considered “high risk” is also banned; users are not allowed to show imagery that depicts high-risk viral challenges.
Coimisiún na Meán is responsible for regulating social media giants’ activities in Ireland and in some cases across the EU.
“Our main job is to make sure that they have the systems and processes that mean that they take things down proactively. That is really our focus, if they do not have those systems or processes, if they are not adequate, if that results in content not being taken down, then we have powers to demand that they come into compliance.
“Ultimately there are powers to impose fines of up to 6 per cent of their global turnover,” he said, but noted that although there are five different such investigations ongoing, they have not exercised that power.
Godfrey said social media companies should be “taking down this sort of content, deleting it, when they become aware of it, either by detecting it or when it is reported to them”.
Platforms have an obligation not to “amplify” this content through their recommender systems, and they must uphold their own terms and conditions that “ban people from uploading content that glorifies violence”.
He said this content is frequently reposted beyond the original account that uploaded the video, or is cross-posted on to other social media platforms.
Godfrey said the commission has discussed the matter with An Garda Síochána and was “aware of their concerns about glorification”, and that companies have an obligation to report serious crimes on their platforms.
The five youths who died have been named as Kamil Pustkowski (17) from Limerick; Jack Kennedy, also 17, from Athy, Co Kildare; Jeremy O’Brien (18) from Carlow; Joe “Joey” Carthy (15) from Athy; and Alex McCarthy (17) from Carlow.
According to sources, the teenagers in the BMW were wearing balaclavas, or were otherwise masked, when they died on the M9. The deceased were aligned to a large group known to gardaí around the Carlow-Kildare region.
It is understood the BMW was not registered to any of the teenagers who were killed or any of their family members. Because of that, gardaí initially suspected it had been stolen.
However, gardaí now believe it changed hands for a small sum of money earlier this month without the registration details for the vehicle being updated.
Videos of stolen cars being driven dangerously on Irish roads are posted to social media almost on a daily basis, gardaí have observed.
The social media accounts of some of the teens contained footage of car thefts and attempts to evade Garda cars in high-speed chases.
Videos of young men stealing cars have been consistently posted to social media for several years but have been ramping up in recent months, gardaí believe.
On Monday, Meta, which operates Instagram and Facebook, said it had policies to restrict users under 18 from seeing imagery depicting real-life dangerous driving likely to cause injury, as well as a prohibition of content promoting criminal or harmful activities such as high-risk viral challenges.
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