TikTok blocks 37million suspicious listings from shop and deactivates accounts

TikTok has blocked 37 million dubious product listings from its e-commerce platform.

As part of a safety report for its digital marketplace, which covered July to December 2023, the social media giant said it had obstructed the registration of two million seller accounts which did not comply with its sign-up requirements.

During this period, TikTok also disclosed it had removed deactivated over one million seller accounts and removed their products due to policy infringements.

Since its launch in 2021, TikTok's shop has grown dramatically. It now boasts a network of 15 million sellers worldwide, six million of which joined the platform during the latter half of 2023 alone.

In its latest safety report, TikTok disclosed that it also removed 133,000 individual products post listing. In addition to these actions, e-commerce features have been removed from more than half a million creators due to violations of rules.

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Jan Wilk, who heads operations for TikTok Shop UK, commented: "As we enable thousands of businesses to sell millions of products, the TikTok Shop Safety Report demonstrates our continued investment in creating safer and trustworthy shopping experiences for our community."

The social media firm said it invested more than £319 million ($400 million) in 2023 on resources, technology and personnel to safeguard its marketplace for consumers and companies.

Despite the ongoing uncertainty surrounding TikTok in the United States, the TikTok Shop continues to grow. This comes after President Joe Biden signed a bill into law that gives ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, nine months to sell its US operations or face a ban.

This action follows years of demands from some US politicians for a ban on TikTok due to security concerns linked to ByteDance's connections with China.

Several governments worldwide, including the UK, have already prohibited the app on government devices.

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