Luis reeled off a list of the kind of content he sees on a regular basis: “Murder, suicide, pedophilic, pornographic content, accidents, cannibalism.” For Carlos, a former TikTok moderator, it was a video of child sexual abuse that gave him nightmares.TikTok’s rapid growth in Latin America—it has an estimated 100 million users in the region—has led to the hiring of hundreds of moderators in Colombia to fight a never-ending battle against disturbing content.The workers interviewed by the Bureau worked on TikTok content, but were contracted through Teleperformance, a multinational services outsourcing company that has more than 42,000 workers in Colombia, making it one of the country’s largest private employers.“If that’s the only dimension you’re looking at, then no content moderation AI company can compete with that.” Psychological support ‘just for show’ Claudia, a current TikTok moderator, told the Bureau she felt anxious and panicked at work after watching successive videos of people eating live animals.Daniela said the company was particularly concerned about those who, like her, worked on the R1 team dealing with the most extreme content – although she personally had never felt the need to use the support."