TikTok has suspended a gamification feature in the European Union following an intervention by the bloc. Given TikTok’s mounting U.S. legal troubles, the announcement went largely unnoticed when it came late Wednesday local time.
TikTok’s move came just two days after the EU opened an investigation into a so-called “tasks and rewards” mechanism in the TikTok Lite app. Concerns were raised about an addictive design that could pose a risk to young people’s mental health. This feature allows users to earn points by, for example, watching and liking TikTok videos. ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, launched this version of TikTok Lite in France and Spain earlier this month.
Under the newly introduced EU online governance and content moderation framework, the Digital Services Act (DSA), TikTok is legally obliged to mitigate systemic risks in areas such as child safety and mental health. But it failed to produce a risk assessment report on the feature when the bloc’s enforcement agencies came knocking.
This is a big deal as the company faces hefty fines under the DSA – up to 6% of its annual global turnover – if it is found to have breached EU rules.
In a statement Posted on X Yesterday, TikTok claimed that it was “voluntarily suspending” the rewards feature in the region to address concerns. However, on Monday, the commission announced that it was preparing to force TikTok to act, saying it intended to use the interim measures contained in the DSA to shut down the app while it conducts an investigation into the feature.
The EU gave TikTok two days to present arguments against a forced shutdown. In this case, TikTok chose to pre-empt enforcement by announcing a “voluntary” suspension.
The development underscores that even the threat of interim enforcement can trigger a blow that forces platform giants to rethink. (We’ve seen something like this before in connection with similar powers contained in the bloc’s General Data Protection Regulation, for example – such as a decision by Google in 2019 to ban human review of audio snippets produced by its voice AI A data protection authority had informed Google of its intention to order the cessation of data processing as part of an expedited procedure.)
This well-known crisis PR tactic aims to forestall the negative publicity that comes with a forced shutdown by taking action before a formal order.
Nevertheless, the EU wins: it reacts to the TikTok announcement with a counterattack Post on XInternal Market Commissioner and Union Internet Sheriff Thierry Breton warned: “Our children are not guinea pigs for social media.”
Breton further wrote that he “notes” TikTok’s suspension of the Lite app rewards program in the EU, adding: “Proceedings against TikTok due to the addictive nature of the platform are ongoing.”
TikTok has been 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 own older phones or primarily connect to 2G or 3G networks.
The EU has launched two DSA investigations into TikTok: The first, announced back 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 became the first very large online platform to face a DSA investigation back in December, just months after the compliance deadline took effect at the end of August. This investigation is also not yet completed.