An Egyptian TikTok creator has been sentenced to prison over a clip in which she told girls that they could make money by posting videos to social media.
The Cairo Criminal Court convicted Haneen Hossam, who is in her 20s, of “human trafficking” but brought her sentence down from 10 years in prison to three years behind bars and a $10,800 fine, a judicial source told AFP.
<mediadc-video-embed data-state="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000161-3486-d333-a9e9-76c6fbf30000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b93390000"},"cms.content.publishDate":1650309849798,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"0000017b-3108-d928-a77f-73ccd2e60000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"cms.content.updateDate":1650309849798,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"0000017b-3108-d928-a77f-73ccd2e60000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"rawHtml":"
var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_50309831", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"992849"} }); ","_id":"00000180-3de7-dfac-a3c2-3ff7ad4e0000","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video EmbedHuman rights activists were unhappy with the decision. The verdict shows the Egyptian court system is “criminalizing what influencers globally do every day when they invite others to work with them and monetize TikTok activity,” wrote Mai El-Sadany, director of the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy, in a tweet thread.
RUSSIA HAS INCREASED ITS TROOP PRESENCE IN EASTERN AND SOUTHERN UKRAINE: PENTAGON
“There are real and serious cases of human trafficking that must be prosecuted — these TikTok cases are not it,” El-Sadany noted.
Hossam’s lawyer, Hussein al Baqar, told AFP the sentence had been reduced from Hossam’s initial 10-year sentence, noting that Egyptian authorities might release the influencer as early as June or July because she had already served 21 months in prison.
Hossam was first arrested in 2020 and sentenced to two years in prison after being convicted of “attacking society’s values” alongside another creator, Mawada al Adham. An appeals court acquitted Hossam in January 2021, but al Adham’s and three other Egyptian creators’ charges were upheld by the court.
Hossam was later charged with human trafficking for profiting off her fans’ “immodest” social media conduct and sentenced in absentia in June 2021.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Egyptian officials are cracking down on what they view as immodest or immoral conduct among women.
Egyptian pop singer Sherine Abdel-Wahab was sentenced to six months in prison in 2018 after joking about the Nile River being poisoned. Another pop star, Laila Amer, was sentenced to two years for inciting “debauchery and immorality” through a music video in which she played a belly-dancing housewife complaining about her mother-in-law.
