'TikTok Under 'Expulsion Pressure' Takes Strong Measure: Limits Teen Usage to 1 Hour Per Day'

Pressure to Ban TikTok in the US, Canada, and European Union
Actual Harm Cases Among Youth Including the 'Fainting Challenge'

Chinese video platform TikTok, which is facing comprehensive regulatory pressure from the United States, the European Union (EU), and others, has taken an 'extreme measure' by limiting the usage time for teenagers in an effort to defuse the situation. This move is interpreted as an attempt to ease the growing 'TikTok ban' movement spreading mainly in the Western world.

According to the Associated Press on the 1st (local time), TikTok announced that as part of efforts to raise awareness among teenage users about how much time they spend on the app, it will limit the usage time for users under 18 to 60 minutes.

[Photo by EPA·Yonhap News]

TikTok explained that the new usage time limit will be automatically applied to accounts of users under 18 within the next few weeks, and teenagers who want to use TikTok beyond 60 minutes will need to enter a separate password.

It also added that teenage users who use the app for more than 100 minutes a day and have not selected the default 60-minute limit will be encouraged to set their own usage limits.

In addition, it introduced that parents can set their children's usage time by day of the week and access a dashboard that shows usage time and other details.

TikTok had introduced parental control features in 2020, allowing parents to limit their children's usage time and viewing content, as well as control messages from specific individuals. Meta's Instagram introduced new parental control features last year to check and limit children's usage time.

Regarding this, Cormac Keenan, TikTok's Head of Trust and Safety, said that with no consensus on reasonable usage limits and their effects, they decided on the usage restrictions with the help of experts from the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children's Hospital in the U.S.

Effectiveness of Teen Usage Time Limits Still in Question

However, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) pointed out that it is questionable how effective TikTok's usage time limits for teenagers will be. WSJ analyzed that many teenagers are already familiar with bypassing parental control features provided by smartphones and social networking service (SNS) apps.

James Steyer, founder of the child protection organization Common Sense Media, argued that usage time limits are a positive step toward creating a safer space for teenagers and their families, but TikTok should not be complacent with this.

He emphasized that TikTok continues to collect user personal information and that teenagers are sometimes exposed to harmful content, highlighting the need for additional measures from TikTok.

'Choking Challenge' Deaths and Other Teen Harm Cases Continue

The U.S. Congress passed a bill on the 28th through the House Foreign Affairs Committee that grants the U.S. President the authority to impose a complete ban on the use of TikTok.
[Photo by Reuters·Yonhap News]

ByteDance, the Chinese parent company of TikTok, was the most downloaded app worldwide last year and is very popular among American teenagers.

However, the 'choking challenge,' where participants strangle themselves until they faint, gained popularity on TikTok, leading to dozens of teenagers worldwide losing their lives by imitating it, resulting in numerous cases where TikTok's harmful trends negatively affect teenagers.

Moreover, as security threats due to personal information collection have come to the forefront, countries including the U.S. and Europe are increasingly moving to ban TikTok from government agencies and other institutions.

The U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a directive on the 27th of last month ordering all federal agencies to remove TikTok from all devices and systems within 30 days, and Canada, Japan, and others have made similar decisions regarding government devices.

On the 28th, the European Parliament also decided to ban employees from using the TikTok app, and the Danish Parliament reportedly sent emails strongly recommending all members and staff delete the TikTok app from work devices, according to foreign media.

In the U.S. Congress, a bill granting the President the authority to impose a complete ban on TikTok use passed the House Foreign Affairs Committee on the same day.