European Commission tells TikTok to make child protection the default

The European Commission has published its preliminary findings on TikTok, issued under the Digital Services Act (DSA). The regulator believes the platform does too little to protect underage users, and it points to specific problems that need to be fixed.

What the complaints are

In the Commission's view, minors' public accounts are set up far too openly. The default settings should be changed so that content posted by a teenager is visible only to the users they themselves have chosen to show it to, and does not end up in the recommendations of a stranger's For You feed. Even private accounts, the regulator notes, are easy to discover through other users' following lists, while the profile photos remain visible to anyone.

Brussels' logic is simple: a high level of protection should not be an option you have to switch on by hand. “Minors deserve a safe experience from the very first moment they go online. The Digital Services Act requires platforms to build protection into the very architecture of their services,” said Henna Virkkunen, the European Commissioner for technology. In her words, a high degree of protection “should be the default setting, not something you have to enable yourself.”

What is at stake

If TikTok fails to address the concerns, the case could end in a finding of non-compliance with the DSA. And that means a fine — up to 6% of the company's global annual turnover.

The pressure on the service is coming not only from Brussels. Last week the UK communications regulator Ofcom opened a similar investigation into child safety; its first results are expected in October. In parallel, another EU inquiry is under way — it is assessing the “rabbit hole effect,” that is, the ability of TikTok's recommendation algorithms to draw a user in and hold their attention. That review has not yet been completed.

The current findings are preliminary: the company has the chance to respond to the concerns and make changes before the regulator moves to a formal decision.

Source: The Verge