UPDATE: April 25, 2024, 11:47 a.m. GMT Because of EU issues, TikTok will voluntarily droop the TikTok Lite rewards program. “TikTok is all the time dedicated to working constructively with the EU Fee and different regulatory authorities. We’re subsequently voluntarily suspending rewards options in TikTok Lite whereas we deal with the issues they’ve raised,” the corporate wrote on X on Wednesday. The unique article follows.
TikTok is formally beneath investigation by the EU, and that impacts all the pieces associated to it, together with the corporate’s spin-off app, TikTok Lite.
Since February, the European Fee (the EU’s govt arm) has been conducting an investigation into TikTok’s compliance Digital Companies Act (DSA). And on Wednesday, the Fee gave TikTok 24 hours to submit a danger evaluation particularly for TikTok Lite, which it stated ought to have been achieved earlier than its launch within the EU.
TikTok Lite, which quietly launched in France and Spain in April, is the data-light model of the app designed for areas with slower web speeds. First launched in Thailand in 2018TikTok Lite at present has over 1 billion downloads, with the highest nations being India, Brazil and Indonesia. in accordance with information aggregator Sensor Tower.
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The part of the app that has significantly drawn the EU’s ire is TikTok Lite’s Duties and Rewards. Reuters stories. Right here, customers can earn 18+ factors by watching and liking movies, following TikTok creators, and referring individuals to the app (The latter can also be obtainable on the primary TikTok app through Rewards). Customers can then redeem these factors for issues like Amazon vouchers or TikTok Cash, the in-app forex you should utilize to pay creators.
Destructible pace of sunshine
In his DiscoverThe European Fee raised issues in regards to the potential influence of TikTok Lite on the psychological well being of customers, together with kids, “significantly with regard to the potential for exciting addictive conduct” – a key focus of the EU’s overarching investigation into TikTok. Along with danger evaluation, TikTok can also be required to supply details about “measures the platform has taken to mitigate such systemic dangers.”
“As a platform that reaches hundreds of thousands of kids and younger individuals, TikTok should absolutely adjust to the DSA and has a particular function in defending minors on-line,” stated Thierry Breton, EU Commissioner for the Inner Market, in a press launch. “As we speak we’re launching this formal infringement process to make sure that applicable measures are taken to guard the bodily and emotional well-being of younger Europeans.”
Breton printed a… much less formal assertion on X (previously Twitter) following the Fee’s request for data.
The tweet might have been deleted
Citing the DSA, the Fee ensured that it “might impose monetary penalties for offering false, incomplete or deceptive data in response to a request for data”.
Only some hours left, TikTok.