Tumblr removed from Apple’s App Store because of child porn

The Tumblr app went down
on Friday.
Shutterstock

• Tumblr’s app was removed from Apple’s App Store because
  the company found child pornography had been slipping past its
  filters.
• In a blog post last week, Tumblr said it was resolving
  an issue with the iOS app.
• The Download reported on Monday that the company
  finding child pornography on its platform was the
  cause.
• Tumblr provided the Download with a statement
  confirming the report, which can now be found on its help
  center blog.

Tumblr’s app vanished from Apple’s App Store on Friday, and on
Monday it was revealed that it was taken down because child
pornography had been slipping past its security safeguards.

Tumblr said last week that its support team was working to
“resolve an issue” with the iOS app. On Monday,
The Download reported that the app was removed due to child
pornography slipping past its security filters.

After The Download published, Tumblr updated its help center blog
post with the following statement (emphasis ours):

“We’re committed to helping build a safe online environment for
all users, and we have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to
media featuring child sexual exploitation and abuse.

“As this is an industry-wide problem, we work collaboratively
with our industry peers and partners like [the National Center
for Missing and Exploited Children] (NCMEC) to actively monitor
content uploaded to the platform.

“Every image uploaded to Tumblr is scanned against an industry
database of known child sexual abuse material, and images that
are detected never reach the platform. A routine audit
discovered content on our platform that had not yet been included
in the industry database.

“We immediately removed this content. Content safeguards are a
challenging aspect of operating scaled platforms. We’re
continuously assessing further steps we can take to improve and
there is no higher priority for our team.”

Apple declined to comment, but a spokesman directed Business
Insider to Tumblr’s blog post. At the time of writing, the Tumblr
app is still unavailable on iOS, but is downloadable on the
Google Play store for Android users.