European regulators have fined the Chinese Communist Party’s TikTok app $368 million for violating children’s privacy, making it the first time the platform has been penalized for breaching Europe’s strict data privacy rules. The Irish Data Protection Commission, the lead privacy regulator for major tech companies in Europe, fined TikTok 345 million euros and reprimanded the platform for violations that occurred during the second half of 2020. The investigation found that the sign-up process for teenage users made their accounts public by default, posing a risk to children under 13. Additionally, a feature intended for parents to manage settings allowed adults to enable direct messaging for users aged 16 and 17 without their consent.
TikTok, of course, disagreed with the decision and said the regulator’s criticisms focused on settings from three years ago. The company noted they had already implemented changes, such as making accounts for users under 16 private by default and disabling direct messaging for 13- to 15-year-olds.
TikTok is also under investigation for potentially violating the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation by transferring users’ personal information to its base in China.
In the past year, Instagram, WhatsApp, and their parent company Meta have also faced significant fines by the Irish regulator. To address concerns about security and user data ending up in China, TikTok has begun localizing European user data and has opened a data center in Dublin this month, the first of three centers planned for the continent.
