Haneen Hossam and Mawada al-Adham's young age main merit behind their acquittal

CAIRO – 3 February 2021: TikTok content creators Mawada al-Adham and Haneen Hossam have been acquitted of “violating family values” in January, and the merits of their acquittal are largely owed to their young age.

The Economic Appeal Court of Cairo said in its judgement that Adham was born in 1998 and Hossam in 2000 22, and although their videos on TikTok “do violate public decency,” but there is also a huge competition amongst young people on social media over followers, which prompted to create these videos.

The two young women were sentenced to two years in prison and fined L.E.300,000, but the sentence was revoked, except that the fine against Adham was upheld.

The charges against the social media starts included “violating family values, luring other girls to exploit them in human trafficking, creating videos that incite immortality, being part of a Whatsapp group to task them with grooming teenage girls to make similar videos, eluding justice and encrypting their phones and accounts.”

Although released, both women are still investigated over the charge of human trafficking, where the prosecution accused them to exploiting their “victim’s poverty” and promising them money if they followed the orders of their “organized human trafficking” group.

Adham had been detained since March and Hossam a month later. Their TikTok videos mainly show them lip-syncing and suggestive dancing to songs. Hossam appeared in new videos dancing in celebration of her release with her hair uncovered for the first time, promising her followers to create a new account. Since their detention, the Adham and Hossam have gained even more popularity with some people and more notoriety with others, but in both cases, they are excepted to garner more views.