A SOCIAL media platform has restored an account belonging to a young boy who died from cancer, admitting the profile and its videos were “wrongly removed.”
TikTok bosses have acknowledged the deletion of late Harrison Boyd’s awareness-raising account and the clips published on the page was made in error.
They have also stressed the removal of the account and its content was not in response to any videos posted on the platform by his mum Tanya, from Clacton.
A spokeswoman for TikTok, which is a video-focused social networking service with one billion monthly users, has now said sorry for censoring Harrison’s material.
She said: “We have restored the videos that were wrongly removed. We sincerely apologise for any distress that may have been caused."
Harrison, 13, died last October after an eight-month fight with an NUT carcinoma cancer which saw him endure a number of treatments and chemotherapy sessions.
Prior to his death, the inspiring schoolboy decided to use TikTok to update his followers throughout his journey.
Regularly posting videos to raise awareness of what it is like to fight cancer, Harrison set out to encourage other children with rare illnesses.
The Harrison’s Army social media movement quickly gathered momentum and before long he had become a viral sensation whose story touched online users worldwide.
However, earlier this week the Gazette told how TikTok had removed videos of his cancer battle and deleted his account, which had amassed thousands of followers.
READ MORE: Clacton mum at war with TikTok over late son's cancer videos
The social media platform uses a combination of technologies and moderation teams to detect, review and remove content or accounts that violate its guidelines.
But mum Tanya, 39, who has since campaigned to keep her son’s legacy alive, felt TikTok was suppressing and unfairly censoring Harrison.
In addition to the platform itself, she had also been battling with users who were regularly reporting her soulmate’s content as inappropriate.
Much to Tanya’s relief, the issue appears to have been resolved, not least due to the camaraderie shown by Harrison’s dedicated followers.
Tanya added: “Harrison has touched so many people’s hearts and the support has been overwhelming.”
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