TikTok called out for blocking George Floyd, Black Lives Matter hashtags

TikTok has issued an apology after it was called out for allegedly blocking certain hashtags related to George Floyd who was killed during arrest by four cops in Minnesota.

While other social media platforms allowed all hashtags to trend, users noticed that it wasn't the same on TikTok.

@revengedja tweeted: "TikTok blocked the #blacklivesmatter tag and every single tag related to George Floyd. This is disgusting. F*vk TikTok".

The social media platform immediately responded:

"We are aware of an issue that is impacting the hashtag view counts displayed at the upload stage. This appears to affect words at random, including terms like #cat and #hello. Our team is investigating and working quickly to address the issue."

TikTok has now issued an apology which also explains the reason why the hashtags couldn't appear.

It reads: "Earlier today we found & fixed an issue that widely affected the view count displayed on hashtags in the upload stage. This bug temporarily affected view count displays on hashtags in the Compose screen only; it did not affect hashtags, videos, or discovery of uploaded content.

"While this technical issue affected a wide range of terms, we recognize that it unfortunately came at a painful time for the Black community in particular. We deeply value the diverse voices on TikTok, and we apologize for the confusion and pain this situation caused".