TikTok deployed specialist crisis teams to prevent footage of the Bondi terrorist attack from spreading on its platform within 90 minutes, despite having no content moderators based in Australia, the company has told the inquiry.
TikTok's global head of policy, trust and safety, Zachary Hecht, travelled from the United States to Sydney to voluntarily give evidence before the inquiry, which is examining the rise of online hate and antisemitism.
The commission was established after the deadliest terrorist attack in Australia's history in December last year, when 15 people were killed during a Hanukkah celebration. The Isis-inspired attack was carried out by father and son Sajid and Naveed Akram. Sajid was shot dead by police at the scene, while Naveed, 24, was arrested and later charged with 59 offences, including 15 counts of murder and one count of committing a terrorist attack.
The attack stunned a nation known for its strict gun laws and prompted renewed calls for tighter controls. In its aftermath, the Australian government established the royal commission to examine antisemitism and social cohesion, with a final report due by December.
Giving evidence on Tuesday, Mr Hecht said TikTok automatically removed 98 per cent of harmful content before it could be viewed by users in Australia during the first quarter of the year.
The commission has previously heard that antisemitic content on TikTok has risen steadily since the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, in which about 1,200 Israelis were killed and hostages were taken, prompting Israel's military offensive in Gaza.
Mr Hecht said every piece of content uploaded to TikTok was screened by automated moderation tools for compliance with the platform's community guidelines before it was published.
He said TikTok explicitly prohibited antisemitic content under its safety and civility policy, including Holocaust denial, hateful conspiracies targeting Jewish people, claims of Jewish supremacy and content that blames an entire group for the actions of an individual.
According to Mr Hecht, TikTok removed just over 67,000 of the more than 110 million videos uploaded during the first three months of 2026 for breaching its safety and civility policy, with the majority detected and removed using artificial intelligence.
TikTok also defended its ability to respond quickly to major incidents despite not employing content moderators in Australia.
"It's like our basic police force versus a SWAT team," TikTok's global head of partnerships, elections and market integrity, Valiant Richey, told the inquiry.
Mr Richey said the company employed 760 staff and 16 contractors in Sydney and Melbourne, but none worked as content moderators.
"(Content moderators are) based in a large number of locations around the world … for a variety of different reasons that might relate to labour supply, to language, to local regulations – it's a complex system," he said.
Meanwhile, a Meta policy director downplayed claims of controversial changes to its policies that led to an increase in antisemitic content across its platforms.
The company, which has 3.5 billion users across Facebook, Instagram and Threads, told the royal commission the company had shifted to a largely reactive approach to enforcing its hateful conduct policy, relying on users to report harmful content.
Meta's core policy director, Benjamin Good, said proactive AI moderation was now primarily reserved for serious violations such as terrorism, drugs, fraud and scams, arguing the change reduced the risk of over-enforcement.
"It's true there may be content that we don't remove because it is not reported, but I do want to emphasise we are very carefully monitoring the extent to which that is the case."
