TikTok has suspended its gamification features in the European Union following intervention by the European Union. The announcement garnered little attention when it was made late Wednesday local time, with attention focused on TikTok's mounting legal troubles in the United States.
TikTok's move comes as the EU launches an investigation into the so-called “tasks and rewards” mechanism of the TikTok Lite app, citing concerns about addictive design that could pose mental health risks to young people. It took place just two days after. This feature allows users to earn points by watching and liking TikTok videos. TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, launched this version of TikTok Lite in France and Spain earlier this month.
Under the EU's relaunched online governance and content moderation rulebook, the Digital Services Act (DSA), TikTok has a legal obligation to mitigate systemic risks in areas such as child safety and mental health. . However, the company failed to produce a risk assessment report on this feature when the block's enforcement officers came knocking.
This is a serious situation because if the company is found to have breached EU rules, it could be subject to hefty fines of up to 6% of its annual global turnover under the DSA.
in a statement Posted in X Yesterday, TikTok claimed it was “voluntarily suspending” its rewards feature in the region to address concerns. But on Monday, the commission signaled it was preparing to forcefully remove TikTok, saying it intended to use interim measures powers contained in the DSA to shut down the app while it investigated the feature. He said that there is.
The EU gave TikTok two days to provide arguments against the forced closure. In this case, TikTok chose to preempt enforcement by announcing a “voluntary” suspension.
This development highlights that even the threat of interim enforcement can have a major impact on forcing platform giants to reconsider. (We've seen this kind of thing before, for example, in relation to similar powers contained in the General Data Protection Regulation for blocks. Data protection authorities had informed Google of their intention to take emergency proceedings to order Google to stop processing data. )
This familiar crisis PR tactic aims to pre-empt the negative publicity associated with forced closures by taking action in advance of formal orders.
Nevertheless, the EU is winning: reacting to TikTok's announcement with a counter Post to XInternal Market Commissioner and Internet Security Officer Thierry Breton warned: “Our children are not social media guinea pigs.”
Our children are not social media guinea pigs.
We will pay attention to TikTok's decision to suspend #TikTokLite “Incentives Program” in the EU.
Litigation over the addictive risks of the TikTok platform continues.#DSA 🇪🇺 Keep your online space safe. https://t.co/J1oI6zNI97
— Thierry Breton (@ThierryBreton) April 24, 2024
Breton went on to write that he was “noted” that TikTok had suspended its Lite app rewards program in the EU, adding that “the litigation against TikTok regarding the platform's addictive risks continues.”
TikTok was contacted to confirm the status of the TikTok Lite app in France and Spain. As the name suggests, TikTok Lite is an alternative TikTok app for users who have older mobile phones or are primarily connected to 2G or 3G networks.
The EU has launched two DSA investigations on TikTok. The first, announced in February, is investigating a wide range of alleged violations in areas such as addictive design, child protection, advertising transparency and data access for researchers. The second, announced earlier this week, focuses on TikTok Lite.
Still, Elon Musk-owned X was the first super-large online platform to come under DSA scrutiny in December, just months after the late August compliance deadline began. This investigation is still ongoing.