EU MP: TikTok CEO 'Must Explain Role in Romanian Poll'

A top EU lawmaker has said TikTok’s chief executive must appear before the European Parliament to answer questions about the website’s role in the Romanian presidential election, which saw a shock victory by little-known pro-Russian candidate Calin Georgescu.

The first-round win by Georgescu spurred serious concern that a TikTok campaign, boosted by “thousands of fake accounts” in the lead-up to the vote, had propelled an unknown candidate from virtual obscurity, a report by Politico said on Wednesday (November 26).

“We call on the CEO of TikTok to come to speak in this house and to ensure his platform conducted to no infringement under the DSA,” Valérie Hayer, head of Renew Europe, a liberal group, told a press conference on Thursday. The DSA is the Digital Services Act, which outlines Europe’s rules for online content.

“Romania is a warning bell: Radicalization and disinformation can happen all over Europe with harmful consequences,” Hayer, a French MP, said.

There were calls for a probe on who funded Georgescu’s campaign on TikTok as he had no party backing and polls had failed to learn that he was popular, the report said, adding that Romania is one of the EU’s 27 member states and also a member of the NATO alliance. A second round vote is due on December 8.

Bogdan Manolea, the head of a Romanian tech and internet campaign group said: “We believed that Tiktok was misused and was led to be misused by him and an army of fake accounts that were used for his purpose.”

But TikTok has described such remarks as ‘highly speculative.’

Read the full report: Politico.