Workers who were obliged to watch very disturbing movies in Tiktok say they were fired after attempting for the union.

Workers are used as Telus Digital, a Canadian company that offers outsourcing services for Tiktok and other things like Facebook Meta.

They say that they have to watch graphic films, harm their mental health and are punished by investigations to improve their conditions. Independent Vat Research journalismHuman

Telus says all workers were dismissed after “documentary abuse, performance problems or workforce reduction”, including one sabotage and the other in which a worker made threatening statements.

Technology companies use a variety of automated systems before they put it on their operating systems to view misuse videos and other harmful content. But many of these surveys are carried out by human workers, who are forced to watch often violent, abusive and other potentially harmful content.

TBIJ interviewed 13 current and former Turkish executives, where Telus is thought to hire about 1,000 workers to examine the content of Tiktok, mainly in Turkish, Kurdish, Arabic and Azerbaijan.

Almost everyone said that they were affected by their work, including the removal of terrorism films, severe violence, child abuse, reproductive tract, self -harm and animal abuse. There have been several cases of mental health, including depression, stress and sleep problems.

According to TBIJ interviews and payments, the executives are also subject to accurate goals and earn between 19,000 and 35,000 Turkish lira (£ 400 pounds) per month. Türkiye’s minimum wage is 22,000 Lira (464 pounds).

According to the çağrı -̇ş union, a group of 15 workers have now made allegations of Telus in the courts after being fired in retribution.

“It has been mentally affected by me for a long time, and I still have those wounds on me … What I have witnessed during my content moderation, I saw these things in my dreams,” said Deniz*.

“There was a video that parents were abusing the child … but you can’t help that child, and when I saw that incest movie, I couldn’t sleep two nights,” he said.

Telus executives are part of the low -income and low -income workforce with the global technology industry that TBIJ has reported on widespread.

Tiktok hire about 40,000 executives and other safety workers around the world, thousands of them through outsourcing such as Telus. It has recently announced several rounds to reduce the size of its immune workforce.

In November last year, TBIJ reported that more than 100 UK -based safety jobs were at risk, while safety teams in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa were exposed to increased in February.

Tiktok told TBIJ that its agreements with outsourcing companies require welfare support for workers. The company said it was trying to upgrade a compassionate work environment for its employees and its contractor’s workforce.

Deniz was one of the Telus workers involved with çağrı-iş, a local union on behalf of the Call Center workers and content executives, who began organizing Telus employees from the beginning of 2024.

“I first became a member of the union and then I began to encourage people to join,” Deniz said. The union says that in the summer, 60 % of Telus eligible workers have easily hired higher than the threshold needed to know, but this Telus created a legal challenge against the union’s right to represent its workers. According to Cihan Sezer, the leader of the çağrı -ş, low rights and a high-pressure work environment were key issues raised by workers.

The workers of Telus began to protest and asked the company to recognize the çağrı-iş and later be fired for dispatching members of the union.

“We organized many public protests, meetings and marches,” Deniz said. “This company … saw me not only as a member of the union, but as an organizer … and I was targeted for them.”

Deniz was fired after attending one of the protests. His termination letter, seen by TBIJ, pointed to the decline in the sector.

Telus said all the firings followed a structural process. The company also argues that the union is not eligible for its workers after re -classification of this sector under Turkish law.

“[Çağrı-İş] It has been recognized by the Ministry of Labor and we have a license, but there is a legal vacuum in Turkish labor laws … because if the company opposes your collective bargaining … the whole process is in the trash. “

ülkü*, another group that complains about the wrong termination, to TBIJ: “After that [Çağrı-İş] Our license from the Ministry of Labor immediately protested, which led to the loss of many workers in the union.

“So during this time, I was a voice and visible fan of the union and tried to share the facts related to the union, not allowing people’s hope to be lost.”

Earlier this year, ülkü was told that his team would be reduced to size and that he was fired. “I haven’t been taught to me, I have not been issued any formal or internal warnings and I was not in a performance improvement program or anything else,” he said. “Felt so suddenly.”

ülkü said that the loss of his job failed to find a job and was working financially.

If workers win in their case, they will receive financial compensation based on their term of service. “The legal process to reach the resolution will take several months,” said Evren çıldır, a lawyer for workers at Telus.

“Kıldır”, who is practicing in Izmir, said, “It’s quite hard.” “If people filter for Tikutok, they are exposed to eight hours of very graphical content such as pornography and sexual abuse of children and graves,” he said.

“With this legal process, all of these can be exposed to it,” he said.

Tiktok executors do eight to nine hours of shifts, some of which during the night with a 45 -minute lunch rest and four 15 -minute rest. Workers told TBIJ that their accuracy, which is evaluated by comparing their decisions against the decisions of a separate team, should not be below 94 %.

Seven of those who talked to TBIJ felt that their wages were inadequate, and some of them were 39 percent in February, citing high inflation in Türkiye. Telus told TBIJ that the average wage increase in January 2025 was 44 %.

Telus employees can plan meetings with a psychologist, but they must use their rest. Two workers told TBIJ that they were unable to make an appointment because psychologists were often over -reserved.

Ayat*, a current presenter said, “I only went once … because when we go to the psychologist, our health interruptions are cut off, so no one goes.” “I prefer smoking.”

“A comprehensive welfare framework has guided the best international practices,” said Telus. The program is monitored by experienced psychologists in psychological health management, safety and clinical interventions in employee welfare. ”

The company has also claimed that it offers “unlimited failures” and said it was rotating the workers through teams to limit the extent of exposure to distress content.

Tiktok told TBIJ that it has stated the advice regulations to ensure a comprehensive welfare support system.

Last month, çağrı -ş held another protest at Telus offices and fought in Turkish courts for his right to represent the legal representative of the Tiktook workers.

“The workers who work inside, they see our actions because we have been abroad many times and we do not give up,” he said.

Zeynep*, a current presenter, said, “Tiktok is a billion dollar company. Tiktok is one of the largest social media networks in the world and they are coin to us … we don’t have a future, we have a hard time maintaining our lives.”

“Workers who tolerate traumatic work conditions are entitled to sustainable psychological support and fair wage, which recognizes their essential role in protecting people from dangerous content,” said Christie Hoffman, the Secretary -General of the World Union.

“It is very cruel that Telus treats these essential workers as disposable workers with a disturbing history of the union’s bustle.”