24/07/2026
🛡️📱 TECH UPDATE: EU WARNS TIKTOK THAT CHILD SAFETY SHOULD NOT BE OPTIONAL
The European Union has issued a strong warning to TikTok, saying that protections for minors should be built in by default—not left as optional settings.
💡 What's the issue?
EU regulators say some teenagers can still change their accounts to public, making their content easier for strangers to discover or interact with.
The Commission argues that children shouldn't have to manually turn on safety features—the safest settings should already be enabled from the moment they create an account.
⚠️ Why does this matter?
According to the EU, weaker default settings can increase the risk of:
• Cyberbullying 💬
• Unwanted contact from strangers 🚫
• Grooming and predatory behavior ⚠️
• Oversharing of personal information 🔒
📜 What could happen next?
These are preliminary findings under the EU's Digital Services Act (DSA). TikTok will have the opportunity to respond.
If the company is ultimately found to be in violation and doesn't make sufficient changes, it could face fines of up to 6% of its global annual revenue.
🧠 Deep insight
The debate is shifting from "Should platforms have safety tools?" to "Should safety be the default?"
Instead of expecting young users to protect themselves, regulators increasingly want technology companies to design platforms that are safe from the very beginning.
🚀 Bottom line:
The future of social media may be judged not only by how engaging it is—but by how well it protects its youngest users before anything goes wrong.
