TikTok failing to remove nearly all accounts reported for advertising drugs, study finds

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TikTok failed to take action over the vast majority of reports made against accounts advertising and offering illegal drugs for sale to UK users, a new study has found.

Researchers flagged hundreds of accounts for selling either cocaine, synthetic-cannabinoid e-cigarette liquids, or marketing themselves as “UK pharmacies”, to TikTok’s user-reporting system from February to July of this year.

But the platform decided there was “no violation” for more than 95 per cent of reports, and after two weeks, 83.5 per cent of accounts remained publicly accessible, according to the findings published in the International Journal of Drug Policy.

Co-author Professor Chris Pudney, from the University of Bath, said the results show a “serious weakness” in the platform’s reporting mechanism.

“This is a straightforward test of a reporting system,” he explained. “These were accounts we identified because they displayed drug-related cues, targeted UK users and contained an explicit offer or route to supply. Yet 95 per cent of our reports came back ‘no violation’.”

Accounts were identified by drug-related “cues” including colloquialisms and emojis. All those reported also indicated they were targeting users in the UK and made some offer of supply, including “delivery” or “post”.

TikTok said it had implemented a search ban on related drug terms referenced in the study earlier this month, and had strengthened in-app reporting since the study was carried out.

Supplying or offering to supply a controlled drug is a criminal offence in the UK and the Online Safety Act also classifies drug supply offences as priority offences.

Since 17 March 2025, regulated user-to-user services have been required to take proportionate measures to prevent users encountering priority illegal content, and to operate proportionate systems and processes designed to minimise how long such content remains available and swiftly remove illegal content once they become aware of it.

TikTok’s own Community Guidelines also prohibit the trade, marketing and promotion of illegal drugs.

Prof Pudney said TikTok often reports very high rates of proactive content removal, but that the study – which is believed to be the first to independently analyse a social media platform’s user-reporting function in this way – raises questions over the effectiveness of the system.

“It’s one thing for a platform to report very high proactive removal rates,” he said. “It’s another for an ordinary user to point directly to apparent drug-selling accounts and be told, repeatedly, that there is no violation.

“Platforms often publish impressive statistics showing how much content they proactively remove, but these tell us very little about whether a platform acts when a user directly reports apparent criminal activity. That gap should be tested, not assumed away.”

He added it was impossible to tell whether the moderation process involved human oversight, but the fact that that every “no violation” decision was returned after precisely 30.5 minutes “suggests that at least some automation is likely to be involved in the process”.

The researchers are now calling for independent, offence-specific tests of reporting systems on social media.

Professor Pudney said: “Ofcom [the regulator] should be independently testing whether the systems that ordinary users rely on to report suspected illegal content work in practice. If an ordinary user can repeatedly point a platform towards apparent drug sellers and receive ‘no violation’, that is exactly the kind of real-world performance a regulator should want to understand.”

A TikTok spokesperson said: “We strictly prohibit the sale or promotion of illegal drugs on TikTok. Whilst the full data set from this research has not been shared with us, we have removed violative content and accounts. We continuously improve our moderation systems, and since this study was conducted, we have strengthened in-app reporting.”

An Ofcom spokesperson said: “The sale and promotion of illegal drugs online can have devastating consequences. Under the Online Safety Act, social media platforms must remove criminal content quickly when they become aware of it – including activity which amounts to an illegal offer to supply drugs – and take appropriate steps to reduce the risk of UK users seeing it in the first place.

“Wherever companies fall short we will take action, and so far we’ve launched investigations into over 100 sites and issued fines totalling £7.1 million. It’s also important this happens alongside effective action from law enforcement against individuals selling illegal drugs online.”

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