PhD Intern, Trust and Safety Algorithm Team (2026)

Job Description

Below is a detailed and enriched job description for the PhD Intern, Trust and Safety Algorithm Team (2026) at TikTok.

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PhD Intern, Trust and Safety Algorithm Team (2026)

About the Role & Team

The Trust and Safety Algorithm Team at TikTok is at the forefront of protecting our platform and users. We are dedicated to developing state-of-the-art computer vision, NLP, and multimodality models and algorithms to identify and mitigate content and behaviors that violate community guidelines and regulations. Our continuous innovation ensures TikTok provides an exceptional and safe user experience, bringing joy to everyone worldwide.

We are seeking talented PhD candidates to join us for an internship in 2026. This internship offers a unique opportunity to make significant contributions to our products, research, and the organization’s future plans and emerging technologies.

What You’ll Do

As a PhD Intern on the Trust and Safety Algorithm team, you will have the chance to dive deep into cutting-edge content understanding and model optimization. Your core responsibilities will include:

• Develop advanced computer vision or multimodality models specifically designed to recognize and detect violating content across the TikTok platform.
• Explore and experiment with state-of-the-art multimodal or computer vision large models, such as CLIP, COCA, ALBEF, BLIP, Flamingo, ViT-G, ViT-22B, and EVA-enormous, to enhance our detection capabilities.
• Investigate and implement the application of Large Language Models (LLMs) in our specific business scenarios, including areas like pre-training, zero-shot/few-shot learning, and sophisticated hard case mining.
• Continuously optimize our distributed model training framework to ensure it effectively adapts to and supports the rigorous demands of training large-scale models.

About the TikTok PhD Internship Program

PhD internships at TikTok are designed to provide students with a hands-on learning experience, allowing them to actively contribute to our innovative products and research initiatives. You will be an integral part of shaping the organization’s future plans and exploring emerging technologies. Our dynamic program blends:

• Hands-on learning and practical application of your research.
• Enriching community-building and development events.
• Direct collaboration with industry experts and leaders in AI.

Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis, so we encourage early submission. Please ensure your resume clearly states your availability (Start date, End date).

Minimum Qualifications

To be considered for this internship, candidates must meet the following requirements:

• Currently pursuing a PhD in Computer Science or a closely related technical discipline.
• Possess related research experience in at least one of the following key areas: computer vision, multimodality, or Large Language Models (LLMs).
• Be proficient with at least one major deep learning framework (e.g., PyTorch, TensorFlow).
• Demonstrate excellent analytical and problem-solving skills, strong logical thinking abilities, and effective communication and collaboration skills.

Preferred Qualifications

The following qualifications are a significant plus:

• Published papers in top-tier AI conferences or journals such as CVPR, ICCV, ECCV, NIPS, ICML, ICLR, TPAMI, IJCV, etc.

Job Information & Benefits

• Compensation (Hourly) – Campus Intern: The hourly rate for this position is $57 – $57.
• Comprehensive Benefits: Interns gain day-one access to health insurance, life insurance, and wellbeing benefits.
• Paid Time Off: Interns receive 10 paid holidays per year and paid sick time (56 hours if hired in the first half of the year, 40 hours if hired in the second half of the year).
• Housing Allowance: Interns who are not working 100% remotely may be eligible for a housing allowance.

Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and country work location. The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.

For Los Angeles County (Unincorporated) Candidates:

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws, including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment:

• Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues.
• Appropriately handling and managing confidential information, including proprietary and trade secret information, and access to information technology systems.
• Exercising sound judgment.

About TikTok

TikTok is the leading global destination for short-form mobile video. Our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. With global headquarters in Los Angeles and Singapore, and offices in major cities worldwide, TikTok is a rapidly growing and innovative company.

Why Join Us

At TikTok, inspiring creativity is at the core of everything we do. Our innovative product empowers people to express themselves authentically, discover new content, and connect with others. This is made possible by our global, diverse teams who work collaboratively to create value for our communities, inspire creativity, and bring joy every single day.

We are committed to doing great things with great people, leading with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make an impact in a fast-paced environment. Every challenge is viewed as an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We are resilient, embrace challenges, and by constantly iterating and fostering an “Always Day 1” mindset, we achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. Join us, where the possibilities are limitless when we create and grow together.

Diversity & Inclusion

TikTok is deeply committed to creating an inclusive space where employees are valued for their skills, experiences, and unique perspectives. Our platform connects people from across the globe, and our workplace reflects this diversity. We are passionate about celebrating diverse voices and creating an environment that mirrors the many communities we reach.

TikTok Accommodation

TikTok is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs, or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at https://tinyurl.com/RA-request.

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By submitting an application for this role, you accept and agree to our global applicant privacy policy, which may be accessed here: https://careers.tiktok.com/legal/privacy