# How is artificial intelligence used in censorship?
Due to the vast amounts of user content posted in social media platforms, companies such as Facebook, Google, Snapchat, and TikTok use artificial intelligence to make almost all censorship decisions about which content will be promoted, hidden, removed or result in users being banned entirely from their platform. This means that content superficially similar to prohibited content can be banned without considering context or artistic merit. In addition, these rules are not applied in the same way to all users, and there have been cases of “VIP” users being shielded from these kinds of automatic decisions at the discretion of social media companies.