TikTok has confirmed it is placing hundreds of jobs at risk in the UK as part of its latest artificial intelligence (AI) restructuring effort.
This overhaul is expected to impact its trust and safety operations as it increasingly adopts AI to carry out its content moderation efforts.
According to the Chinese-owned video-sharing app, it is “concentrating our operations in fewer locations globally” with the restructuring to impact jobs in the UK and south and south-east Asia.
It is understood that hundreds of jobs at TikTok's UK base of operations are now at risk of being axed.
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TikTok is preparing to lay off hundreds of UK workers
|GETTY
As part of the overhaul, the work of affected employees will be reallocated to other offices in Europe and some third-party providerrs.
However, some trust and safety roles and operations positions in the UK will remain in place.
Currently, TikTok UK's head office is based in Farringdon, London with a new office based in the capital's Barbican to open in early 2026.
A spokesperson for the social media giant said: "We are continuing a reorganisation that we started last year to strengthen our global operating model for trust and safety, which includes concentrating our operations in fewer locations globally to ensure that we maximise effectiveness and speed as we evolve this critical function for the company with the benefit of technological advancements.”
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Social media platforms are overhauling their way of doing business as AI is rolled out worldwide
| SORA/ GB NEWSIn recent years, TikTok has TikTok has increasingly opted to take advantage of AI to assist in its efforts to moderate potentially harmful content.
According to the app, more than 85 per cent of the content withdrawn for violating its community guidelines was taken down thanks to automation.
Furthermore, the company claims that AI can slash the amount of damaging or graphic content that its moderation team are forced to expose themselves to.
A spokesperson for the Communication Workers Union claimed that this business decision will cause more harm for Britain outside of job cuts.
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They explained: "This news will put TikTok’s millions of British users at risk.
“TikTok workers have long been sounding the alarm over the real-world costs of cutting human moderation teams in favour of hastily developed, immature AI alternatives.
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Ahead of the introduction of the Online Safety Act, YouGov released a poll that showed widespread support for the measures | YOUGOV "This has been a constant concern throughout the process of TikTok workers’ efforts to form a union."
The downsizing of its content moderation team comes after the passage of the Online Safety Act, which is deigned to make the internet a safer place for Britons.
Under the controversial piece of legislation, new duties have been placed on social media companies and search engines to protect users from illegal content and harmful material, especially for children.