According to Federal Drug Commissioner Burkhart Blienert (SPD), TikTok should no longer be available to children under the age of twelve. The app is extremely popular among children and young people, but youth advocates like Blienert are concerned about TikTok’s growth. “We have to look very closely when drugs or violence are glorified.” Blienert told the Rheinische Post. “There doesn’t have to be a Wild West on social media.”
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For Blienert, the platform poses risks because a child cannot decide “how to deal with AI-generated content and symbols that instruct them to constantly stay on TikTok.” Therefore, the platform should be restricted for children up to the age of twelve. “Only then will young people be able to better assess how they can use social media sensibly, what is good for them and what is not,” is Bienert’s opinion.
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TikTok itself has stipulated in its terms of use that only people aged 13 or over can use the platform. Blienert is now in favour of controlling access more strictly: “TikTok should be sorted by age up to 18 with technical restrictions in order to exclude dangerous elements,” the SPD politician demands.
The problem with all these demands: On the one hand, the age limit is difficult to control, and on the other hand, it is unlikely to be enforced. First of all, all TikTok users in Germany will have to prove their age digitally. The most obvious way to do this is to use the online ID card function. TikTok will require its users to allow their age to be read from their ID cards using a card reader or ID app for smartphones.
It will be difficult to enforce age limit
In theory, this would be conceivable. However, it would be easy to evade the age limits this way. Keep in mind, the restrictions would only apply to German users, while TikTok is available in over 160 other countries. With the help of a VPN connection, German age restrictions can be easily circumvented by users accessing the service in another country.
At least in other EU countries, this is likely to increase the pressure on TikTok to take stronger measures to protect minors. With the EU Digital Services Act (DSA), very large online platforms (“VLOPS”) such as Instagram or TikTok and search engines (“VLOSE”) are directly regulated by the European Commission.
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