China’s TikTok rival flooded with porn and violent video in cyberattack

China’s popular short-video app Kuaishou, a top rival to TikTok’s Chinese version Douyin, was hit by a massive cyberattack earlier this week, leaving millions of users shocked.

The attack happened on Monday night around 10 p.m., when thousands of pornographic and violent videos suddenly appeared on the app’s livestreaming service for about 90 minutes. Users immediately took to social media, complaining about the shocking content.

One Weibo user wrote, “What happened to Kuaishou? Every livestream I open is just porn.” Another said, “Kuaishou has gone crazy. My eyes can’t handle this.”

In a statement on Tuesday, the Beijing-based company blamed the attacks on “underground and gray industries”, referring to illegal or semi-legal online operations. Kuaishou added that the police had been notified and the app was slowly returning to normal.

China has some of the world’s strictest internet rules. The government blocks foreign sites and bans pornography completely. Despite these controls, cyberattacks are becoming more common.

The Cyberspace Administration of China noted that malware attacks are rising, with over 3.49 million daily attempts on average.

So far, no group has claimed responsibility for the Kuaishou hack. Reports say the attack used artificial intelligence to bypass security, hack user data, and operate 17,000 bot accounts that streamed the illegal videos, paralyzing the platform.

Kuaishou is China’s second-largest short-video platform, with more than 416 million daily users, trailing only Douyin. The cyberattack caused the company’s Hong Kong-listed shares to drop by 6% on Tuesday.

Cybersecurity experts say the damage was worsened by the use of automated tools. These tools can create multiple fake accounts and control bots to spread content in seconds, faster than manual moderation systems can handle.

The incident comes as China prepares a new law that will impose stricter fines for sharing obscene content online. Some reports wrongly claimed that sending such content even to friends could be criminalized. Officials later clarified that private sharing is not punished unless reported.

The attack has sparked online debates over internet safety, AI misuse, and censorship, highlighting the challenges China faces despite strict controls.

By CNN