U.K. Probes TikTok Over Child Safety Measures

Ofcom said Thursday that under the U.K.’s Online Safety Act, social-media companies are obliged to use highly effective age assurance methods to be able to identify minors using their services and to ensure they don’t see harmful content.

The regulator said in a separate report that many social-media companies have opted to use so-called age inference models, in which websites assess users’ age based on how they interact on the platform.

“In some cases age inference models, such as those used by TikTok, may have failed to correctly identify a significant proportion of children, putting them at risk of exposure to harmful content,” Ofcom said. The investigation will check whether TikTok is complying with U.K. law, Ofcom said. The regulator will give an update on the probe in October, it added.

A TikTok spokesperson said the company meets the obligations of the Online Safety Act and that it would work with Ofcom to demonstrate this.

“We strictly enforce age-appropriate experiences through expert-informed platform rules and advanced age inference technologies, in line with major industry peers,” the spokesperson said.

Write to Edith Hancock at [email protected]