On February 19, the European Union (EU) announced a formal investigation into TikTok, the Chinese short-form video hosting service owned by ByteDance, for alleged breaches of its obligations to protect minors online, under a new law that polices digital content.
The EU’s concerns are with regards to TikTok’s age verification tools, which according to it, may not be reasonable, proportionate or effective, stated reports.
Since Brussels rolled out Digital Services Act (DSA), this is the second probe into a major online platform, with Elon Musk’s X (in December) being the first.
The EU is concerned that TikTok was not taking necessary measures or was not doing enough to address its negative impacts on the youth.
What stands as worrisome is the ‘rabbit-hole’ effect, which occurs when users are fed content based on an algorithm.
EU has opened up formal proceedings, as per a media report, to understand and assess whether TikTok breached DSA in arenas such as ‘advertising transparency’ and ‘data access for researchers’.