- ByteDance used content from other platforms to create fake accounts on Flipagram, BuzzFeed reported.
- They began the practice in 2017 to train its personalization algorithm for US users.
- It was one of the tactics used to boost its app Flipagram's popularity.
TikTok's parent ByteDance took large amounts of content from Instagram and Snapchat without their knowledge or consent and published them via fake accounts to TikTok's predecessor, Flipagram, in 2017, BuzzFeed News reported Monday, citing information from four former employees who spoke to the outlet.
ByteDance used the scraped content to train its algorithm that recommends content to US users based on their interests, they said. The algorithm would ultimately be used by TikTok and its Chinese equivalent, Douyin.
The approach was part of Beijing-based ByteDance's "growth hack" strategy to expand its struggling Flipagram platform, BuzzFeed said. ByteDance acquired the video app in January 2017 and renamed it Vigo. It ultimately shut down the service in late 2020, according to TechNode and a cached version of Vigo's announcement on its official website.
But before shuttering Flipagram, Bytedance used data from Instagram, Snapchat, and Musical.ly to populate its site in a bid to entice users, according to the former Bytedance employees who spoke to BuzzFeed.
According to those employees, Bytedance first created fake accounts and populated them with short videos from its Chinese apps that were "not too Chinese." But when that strategy failed to attract new users, ByteDance started taking short-form videos, usernames, profile pictures, and profile descriptions from Instagram, Snapchat, and Musical.ly.
ByteDance did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
According to BuzzFeed, the China-based engineering team that was in charge of "growth hacking" Flipagram scraped more than 10,000 videos a day, BuzzFeed said. Sources told the outlet that ByteDance used the content to finetune its "For You" algorithm to cater to US users' preferences.
ByteDance's tactics didn't go unnoticed, however. Some Instagram users complained that their content appeared on Flipagram without their knowledge or content. (Ironically, other users complained that they were unable to upload Instagram photos to their Flipagram accounts.) Some worried they were being impersonated, while others expressed concern that their children's content was published on an app that they were unfamiliar with, they told BuzzFeed.
ByteDance previously found itself in legal trouble for infringing intellectual property rights. Last year, Chinese social media and gaming giant Tencent launched a series of lawsuits in China against ByteDance's Douyin for copyright infringement.