A new complaint to the FTC alleges TikTok of child privacy protection violation

Recently, the popular video-sharing platform TikTok has had some issues with allegations of relations to the Chinese government and therefore has been accused by some as being a national security threat. Now, The LA Times reports about a new allegation, concerning the popular among young people video-sharing social media, and it’s about child privacy.

Reportedly, a coalition of child privacy advocates filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), alleging that TikTok has been collecting sensitive data from accounts of minors under the age of 13, despite a previous agreement to stop. Last year, TikTok was fined by $5.7 million by the FTC for child privacy violations.

Now, the new complaint alleges TikTok failed to comply with the agreement with FTC and violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), and allegedly did not destroy the data the company gathered beforehand on children which were then under the age of 13. The company offers a different type of TikTok accounts for children under 13, but some children can lie about their age. Reportedly, the aforementioned groups had found many regular TikTok accounts, created by young children with uploads from as early as 2016.

TikTok has recently announced that it is going to implement some new features for parental controls on its platform, allowing parents to monitor the time their children are spending on TikTok and limit inappropriate content. Additionally, an organization called the Dutch Data Protection Authority (DPA) which investigates privacy concerns, is going to investigate TikTok. TikTok's owner ByteDance told Reuters last month that it is cooperating with the Dutch DPA’s investigation on the matter of how TikTok handles children's privacy. Results from the investigation are expected later this year, according to Reuters.