TikTok in Vietnam: Learning to Dance With Shackles On

A sword of Damocles seems to be hanging over TikTok just ahead of a “comprehensive” probe into its operations in Vietnam, which started 15 May.

The authorities have repeatedly harped on how “toxic” information on TikTok — chief among them fake news and anti-state content — “poses a threat to the country’s youth, cultural values and tradition.” They have highlighted that any failure to comply with Vietnamese regulations could see TikTok being shown the door in a market where it boasts around 50 million local users.

Vietnam’s state-controlled media outlets have amplified the message by the authorities. Their criticism centered on how TikTok has become an incubator for influencers to initiate “malicious trends”, accommodated advertisements for contraband merchandise, and enabled users to stream pirated content.

The fuss that Vietnamese authorities are making about TikTok, however, is likely obscuring their real intent when placing the platform under stricter scrutiny — clamping down on material deemed to be detrimental to the state.

To begin with, the interdisciplinary inspection delegation into TikTok’s operations does not appear to have agencies with links to the country’s youth. The delegation consists of officials from various government agencies, such as ministries of information and communications, public security, industry and trade, and culture as well as the central tax department. There is a visible absence of officials tasked with youth-related affairs such as the Central Youth Union, the Ministry of Education and Training and the parliamentary youth committee.

Vietnamese authorities have lamented that a big chunk of “toxic” content on TikTok besmirches the reputation of the country’s leadership and the legitimacy of the ruling Communist party. But intriguingly, they have stopped short of expressing their views on a slew of other clips that heap fulsome praise on Vietnamese leaders on the same platform.

The government’s approach is fairly consistent. During the dawn of the Internet in the early 2000s, Vietnamese authorities rationalised tightening the screws on the online sphere on the need to curb pornography and other sexually explicit content, saying that “harmful” online content not controlled well could have a bad influence on the youth. But during the 2005-2006 period, Vietnamese authorities did not block any pornographic content when they had highlighted the need to do so, according to a report by OpenNet Initiative, a collaborative partnership of Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge and Toronto universities. In the past 25 years, the censors have focused instead on what they perceived to be anti-state content.

A familiar pattern seems to be at work again this time around. In announcing the TikTok inspection, Vietnamese authorities were also explicit that the crackdown on anti-state content would be another key tenet. In fact, it is likely to be the dominant factor that dictates what the probe would do.

Vietnamese authorities have lamented that a big chunk of “toxic” content on TikTok besmirches the reputation of the country’s leadership and the legitimacy of the ruling Communist party. But intriguingly, they have stopped short of expressing their views on a slew of other clips that heap fulsome praise on Vietnamese leaders on the same platform.

Removing online content that the authorities disfavour has remained a key tactic in Vietnam’s online censorship dragnet. In 2020, Vietnam threatened to block Facebook if it did not yield to government pressure to take down anti-government posts on its platform. The lure of a lucrative market of 97 million people has compelled Big Tech to acquiesce to state censorship demands, becoming inured to honouring content removal orders. Hanoi now brags about high compliance rates by Facebook and YouTube, which all exceed 90 per cent.

TikTok appears to be following the path of the other social media platforms. But latest data from its transparency reports show that in the second half of 2022, TikTok’s compliance rate was lower, at 74.4 per cent. Unlike Facebook and YouTube, TikTok does not provide a concrete breakdown of what kind of content was taken down on government requests in each country, only broadly attributing the removal to violations of community guidelines and local laws. But according to a 2020 Reuters report, the platform has “blocked most political content for years” in Vietnam.

It is thus likely that the upcoming inspection will serve to further strong-arm TikTok into becoming more compliant and answerable to Vietnamese censors. In a more sweeping move, the authorities are likely to use the inspection as a pretext to tighten the grip on narratives online, fortify state controls on social media, and solidify the government’s increasing leverage over Big Tech.

Granted, TikTok, the only foreign social media platform to have set up shop in Vietnam, should be regulated. Its algorithm, not friendships or follows as on U.S. social media platforms, chiefly dictates what content users see. The “For You” page, which recommends videos based on what users have watched and engaged, is tantamount to a Pandora’s box that is poised to send users down the rabbit hole of other videos containing fake news, misinformation and disinformation.

But regulation of the platform needs to put public interests above all else. If the Vietnamese government is really sincere about protecting its youths from harmful content on TikTok, the first major step forward would be to rein in its algorithm, making the platform more granular and transparent.

If turning off the recommendation algorithm does not sound realistic, at least the platform should be obliged to do so for content considered harmful to the young. The authorities should not be the sole arbiter entrusted with deciding what constitutes harmful content online. This is an undertaking that has to involve other grassroots actors from the outset.

The public is ill-served by the authorities exploiting legitimate public concerns as a pretext to serve their political agenda. In doing so, Vietnamese authorities risk undermining the very reputation they are scrambling to protect in the cybersphere.

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