Trolls are an unfortunate part of our online lives. Like a porta-potty at a college football tailgate, these odious individuals should be avoided at all cost. But in the world of social media, that can be incredibly difficult.
Thankfully, companies are taking steps to flush the trolls out of our social media circles. Case in point, on Wednesday, TikTok, the short form video social network, announced a new feature designed to cut back on negative interactions: the ability to filter all comments from users before they appear on your account.
Here’s how to enable the feature, as well TikTok’s other safety and privacy settings, to ensure you can have the best experience on the social network as possible.
Whether you’re using TikTok or your kids are, hateful or disturbing comments can ruin your online interactions, and keep you from using the platform.
Sure, you have the option of blocking everyone from commenting on your posts, but that takes most of the fun out of using TikTok. By using Filter all comments, though, you can approve each comment you want to appear on your post, keeping any negative comments out of public view.
It’s not a perfect solution — you’ll still have to see hurtful posts by filtering them — but it takes the power away from the trolls who get their kicks by trying to humiliate people publicly.
To enable Filter all comments, tap the Me tab at the bottom of your TikTok Home page and select the settings menu — three horizontal buttons — at the top of the screen.
From there, choose Privacy and scroll down to Comment filters at the bottom of the page.
From the Comment filters page, you’ll see options for Filter all comments, Filter spam and offensive comments, and Filter keywords.
Filter all comments will prevent any comments from appearing on your posts without your approval. You can review those comments in Review filter comments at the bottom of the screen, and approve the ones you want to show up.
Filter spam and offensive comments, meanwhile, will stop comments that are, well, offensive from showing up on your posts unless you approve them.
Then there’s Filter keywords. From here, you can choose certain keywords that you find offensive, and block any comments that include them from appearing in your posts without your approval.
Setting up those options should help take down the trolls a few notches. But if it’s not enough, you can also block accounts that are particularly damaging. To do that, navigate to the person’s TikTok page and tap the settings button in the top right corner of the screen.
Next, tap Block and select Confirm. From now on they won’t be able to see your content or profile on TikTok.
If you really want to lock down your account, you can also prevent your videos from being downloaded, something I highly suggest; manage who can send you direct messages; and control who can Duet and Stitch with your videos, all from the Safety dashboard in the Privacy menu.
With those settings in place, you should be able to get the most out of TikTok without dealing with any trolls.
Now get back to dancing, or hating side bangs, or whatever you’re up to on there.
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Got a tip? Email Daniel Howley at [email protected] over via encrypted mail at [email protected], and follow him on Twitter at @DanielHowley.
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