‘Honorary Killing?’ Pakistan Father Murders Daughter Over Tiktok Video

A Pakistani man suspected of killing his U.S.-born 15-year-old daughter in a so-called honor killing after she apparently refused to stop sharing videos on TikTok appeared in court Thursday in the southwestern city of Quetta, police said.

The man, who was arrested Wednesday, recently moved his family back to Pakistan from the United States, police said.

The shooting happened on Tuesday in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province, said Babar Baloch, a local police chief. He said the father of the teenager initially suggested that an unidentified gunman had killed his daughter, but after he was taken into custody for questioning he confessed to the crime.

Baloch said the man’s brother-in-law was also arrested in connection with the killing, and that both men had apparently objected to the girl’s sharing of “objectionable” content on TikTok, a social media platform used by 54 million people in Pakistan.

Baloch said a judge has allowed police to keep the two men in custody for 10 days during an investigation.

So-called honor killings are common in Pakistan, where family members and relatives sometimes kill women who don’t follow local traditions and culture or decide to marry someone of their own choice.

TikTok Ban

The short-form video-hosting service TikTok has been under a de jure nationwide ban in the United States since January 19, 2025, due to the US government’s concerns over potential user data collection and influence operations by the government of the People’s Republic of China.

The ban took effect after ByteDance, the China-based parent company of TikTok, refused to sell the service before the deadline of the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. Prior to the ban, individual states, cities, universities, and government-affiliated devices had restricted TikTok.

In 2020, President Donald Trump proposed a ban of the app as he viewed it as a national security threat. In August, he signed an executive order instructing that ByteDance divest from the app, though the order was blocked by a court injunction in September and was reversed by the Biden administration in 2021.

However, in 2024, the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act was proposed in Congress, again ordering that ByteDance divest due to alleged security concerns and pro-Palestinian bias. The bill was approved by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden. Following a lawsuit from TikTok, the law was upheld by the Supreme Court.

On January 18, 2025, the day before the deadline of the law, TikTok suspended its services in the United States. The following day, after President-elect Trump signaled that he would grant an extension to TikTok upon being inaugurated, services were restored. On January 20, the first day of his term, Trump signed an executive order that halted enforcement of the ban for a 75-day period.