An Apple employee has claimed that the company is threatening to fire her due to a video that she posted on TikTok.
In a recent video posted to the platform, Paris Campbell, @stopitparis, called Apple out and addressed how the company might be firing her, after working as a repair technician for six years, because she posted a video about scammers.
“I’m an Apple employee and this is a message to Apple,” she said. “Right now, I’m patiently waiting to find out if I’m getting fired for a video I posted three days ago.”
In her initial clip, which has over 7.1m views, Campbell responded to a woman named Stella who lost her phone and was receiving messages from someone in China about her device being “jailbroken”.
The scammer had also threatened to leak Stella’s information on the black market if she didn’t remove her iPhone from her Apple ID. However, Campbell encouraged her not to delete that iPhone and said that Stella was only being contacted because the device couldn’t be resold, as it couldn’t be unlocked until the right Apple ID or password was entered.
In her video to Apple, she said that everything she told Stella was “already public knowledge” and that she did not “breach [any] form of confidentiality whatsoever”. She also emphasised that all she did was make a video that resonated with people.
However, she claimed that Apple has still told her that she didn’t follow “company policy,” since she identified herself publicly as an employee. She went on to note that according to Apple’s policies, she wasn’t banned from saying where she worked.
“Funny thing is, though, after reviewing the social media policies, there is no mention of that specifically,” she said. “Nowhere does it say I can’t identify myself as an Apple employee publicly, just that I shouldn’t do so in a way that makes the company look bad.”
She also highlighted how her video about scammers was done to help “reinforce the public’s confidence in Apple security,” which doesn’t make the “company look bad”.
Campbell went on to get more “technical” and addressed how she never specifically said that she worked for Apple, until posting her video to the company.
“I’ve never actually identified myself as an Apple employee until this video,” she said, before detailing how she wants to continue working for the company and has been a “stellar employee”.
The TikTok user then discussed a conversation that she had with her manager, who told her that it wasn’t her job to create videos.
“This morning, my manager kindly informed me that you guys don’t pay me to make TikTok videos,” she told Apple. “Which is totally right, you don’t. This is something that I enjoy doing in my spare time. So I guess I’m getting fired of simping?”
She continued to emphasise that she has now posted many videos about scammers, which have done “very well”. She also said that “talking about” Apple products and technology is one of the things she’s “best at,” which is why the company hired her.
She concluded the clip by telling the company how strange it was that they wanted to fire her, as most of her videos make Apple “look really good”.
“As a company, the fact that you don’t want to take advantage of me, and you want to fire me,” Campbell added. “That’s wild. So this is me going above my manager’s head, doing the thing that probably will get me fired.”
As of 15 August, the video has more than 635,700 views, with TikTok users in the comments calling Apple out and praising Campbell for creating such insightful videos.
“@apple girl is helping your customers and doing it in a very articulate, understandable way. Really apple?” one wrote. “This how you gonna do her? Promote her.”
“Your explanation of Apple’s phone security reassured me as a customer that my data is in good hands. Seems weird to me you’d be penalised for that,” another added.
A third person wrote: “As an Android user that vid made me question the security of my device. You should get a promotion.”
The Independent has contacted Apple and Campbell for comment.
