European regulator fines Tiktok €345 million for child privacy violations

A European tech regulator has ordered TikTok to pay a €345 million ($368 million) fine after determining that the app did not adequately protect children.

The Irish Data Protection Commission, which oversees TikTok’s operations in the European Union, announced on Friday that the company violated the bloc’s signature privacy law.

The DPC investigated and discovered that TikTok’s default settings did not effectively secure children’s accounts in the second half of 2020.

For example, it stated that newly created children’s profiles were set to public by default, allowing anyone on the internet to view them.

TikTok failed to adequately disclose these privacy concerns to children and utilised so-called “dark patterns” to persuade users to share more of their personal information, the regulator observed.

Another infringement of EU privacy law was that a TikTok function called Family Pairing, which was designed as parental control did not require an adult managing a child’s account to be validated as the child’s actual parent or guardian, according to the DPC. According to the regulator, the lapse allowed any adult to potentially impair a child’s privacy precautions.

In April 2020, TikTok released Family Pairing, which allows parents to link their accounts with child accounts to monitor screen time, prevent inappropriate content, and limit direct chat to youngsters.

The DPC’s judgement allows the corporation three months to correct its infractions and includes a written reprimand.

TikTok did not immediately answer CNN’s request for comment.

‘No longer relevant’

But in a blog post-Friday, the company said it “respectfully” disagreed with several aspects of the ruling.

“Most of the decision’s criticisms are no longer relevant as a result of measures we introduced at the start of 2021,” wrote TikTok’s European privacy chief, Elaine Fox.

TikTok changed its settings in early 2021, keeping current and new accounts private by default for users aged 13 to 15, according to Fox. She also stated that later this month, “we will begin rolling out a redesigned account registration flow for new 16- and 17-year-old users” that will default to private settings.

TikTok did not explicitly state that family pairing will now verify an adult’s relationship with a child. However, the company stated that the functionality has been reinforced over time with more options and tools. It also stated that none of the regulator’s investigations determined that TikTok’s age verification processes violated EU privacy law.

In April, TikTok was also fined in the United Kingdom for several breaches of data protection law, including misusing children’s data.