Addis Ababa, September 15, 2021(Walta) – TikTok is under investigation by The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) – it is a lead regulator in the EU – over two privacy-related issues.
The watchdog is looking into its processing of children’s personal data, and whether TikTok is in line with EU laws about transferring personal data to other countries, such as China.
TikTok said privacy was “our highest priority”.
The Irish DPC said it was specifically looking into GDPR-related issues.
These are the EU privacy laws that can potentially lead to enormous fines of up to 4% of a company’s global turnover.
It said the first inquiry would examine “the processing of personal data… for users under age 18, and age verification measures for persons under 13”. It will also look into how transparent TikTok has been about how it processes such data.
According to BBC, it is not the first time the Irish DPC has investigated such matters. In October 2020, it announced it was looking into Instagram’s handling of children’s personal data.
And Tiktok has already faced a similar collective legal action in the UK, spearheaded by a former children’s commissioner.