The U.S. division of TikTok, officially known as TikTok USDS Joint Venture, has announced its participation in Lantern, a collaborative initiative aimed at enhancing child safety across various social media platforms. This move comes eight months after TikTok was restructured as a separate entity.
Launched in 2023, Lantern is designed to facilitate cooperation among social media companies to securely exchange information regarding harmful behaviors and content, enabling the identification of individuals engaging in inappropriate actions across multiple platforms. Prominent members of this initiative include tech giants such as Google, X, Snap, Twitch, Meta, Discord, Microsoft, Apple, and Reddit.
Marc Leone, the director of Lantern, emphasized the importance of cross-platform collaboration, stating, “Identifying and disrupting child sexual exploitation and abuse is essential, and the involvement of TikTok USDS JV will enhance coordinated enforcement efforts across the broader tech landscape.”
TikTok’s decision to join Lantern aligns with the participation of many of its rivals in the program. Since its inception, Lantern reports that its member companies have shared over 2 million signals of potentially harmful behavior.
In compliance with legal obligations, TikTok’s U.S. arm has been actively reporting incidents of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and other threats to children’s safety to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) through its CyberTipline. Additionally, TikTok has pledged a $2 million contribution to assist NCMEC in modernizing its CyberTipline.
The investment is aimed at enabling NCMEC to implement advanced search, automation, and analysis tools to more rapidly detect threats, reduce manual processing times, and expedite actionable reports to law enforcement when a child’s safety is at risk. According to TikTok, this initiative is anticipated to span three years and require a total investment of $10 million, with contributions from partners including AWS, Microsoft, and Palantir.
