The U.K.’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has opened an investigation into online platforms TikTok, Reddit, and Imgur to assess the steps they are taking to protect children between the ages of 13 and 17 in the country.
To that end, the watchdog said it’s probing how the ByteDance-owned video-sharing service uses the personal data of children in the age range to surface recommendations and deliver suggested content to their feeds.
“This is in light of growing concerns about social media and video sharing platforms using data generated by children’s online activity in their recommender systems, which could lead to young people being served inappropriate or harmful content,” the ICO said.
Separately, the data protection regulator said it’s also looking into Imgur and Reddit to see how they are using children’s information and the measures they are taking to assess the age of their users and tailor content based on that criteria.
The ICO noted that it’s examining whether the services have infringed on data protection laws, and that it will share any discovered evidence, if any, to the companies to seek their “representations” before arriving at a final conclusion.
“The responsibility to keep children safe online lies firmly at the door of the companies offering these services and my office is steadfast in its commitment to hold them to account,” John Edwards, U.K. Information Commissioner, said.
“In announcing these investigations, we are making it clear to the public what action we are currently taking to ensure children’s information rights are upheld. This is a priority area, and we will provide updates about any further action we decide to take.”
The development comes in the aftermath of the enforcement of Children’s code in September 2021 that requires online services to follow a set of standards when using children’s data.
Since then, X (formerly Twitter) has stopped serving advertisements to users under 18 and removed the ability for those below the age of 18 to opt in to geolocation sharing. Viber has also committed to disable personalized advertising for children.
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