TikTok, the popular short-form video app owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance, says it removed over 3.6 million videos posted by Nigerian users in the first quarter of 2025 for violating its content guidelines.
This was revealed in the platform’s Q1 2025 Community Guidelines Enforcement Report, which shows a significant increase in enforcement activity compared to previous periods. The number of Nigerian videos taken down marks a nearly 50% rise from the 2.4 million removed in the final quarter of 2024.
According to the report, 98.4% of the removed videos were flagged through proactive detection systems before any user reports were made. Additionally, 92.1% of the violative content was removed within 24 hours of being posted.
Crackdown on Disinformation and Fake Engagement
In a broader regional sweep, TikTok said it also took action against covert influence operations in March 2025, shutting down 129 accounts across West Africa for violating the platform’s policies on inauthentic behavior and misinformation.
Globally, TikTok removed over 211 million videos in Q1 2025, up from 153 million in Q4 2024. Of those, more than 184 million were removed using automated tools, reflecting the platform’s ongoing reliance on AI to moderate content at scale.
TikTok’s global proactive detection rate hit 99%, underscoring improved systems for identifying harmful content before it spreads.
As part of its efforts to combat spam and fake engagement, the platform also deleted 44.7 million comments linked to inauthentic or automated accounts during the same period.
“We remain vigilant in our efforts to detect external threats and safeguard the platform from fake accounts and engagement,” TikTok said in the report. “These threats persistently probe and attack our systems, leading to occasional fluctuations in the reported metrics within these areas.”
The company reaffirmed its commitment to platform integrity, vowing to continue removing any content, accounts, or activities aimed at artificially inflating popularity or misleading users.
