Improved Teens’ Privacy And Safety With TikTok

TikTok is a place for anyone from all walks of life to share creativity, be entertained, and be inspired. No matter what niche they’re interested in, TikTok’s mission is to make sure everyone can find their community through #BookTok or #renovation. TikTok also strives to foster a safe environment for these vibrant and diverse communities.

With TikTok, users have access to a range of privacy and safety controls, allowing them to choose who gets to see their content. Furthermore, TikTok wants to make sure that its platform provides even stronger proactive protections for teens, and has continually updated its platform in order to support age-appropriate experiences. Under this plan, accounts belonging to people under 16 will be made private by default, Direct Messaging will only be available to people 16 and older, and parents will be able to supervise their teens’ TikTok activity through Family Pairing.

A set of changes introduced recently by TikTok seeks to further enhance the proactive protections offered to teens aged 13-17. As these changes are rolled out globally in the coming months, the community will continue to see them.

New privacy settings for Direct Messaging
In an effort to help teens make active choices about their privacy settings, TikTok is setting Direct Messaging to ‘No One’ by default for anyone aged 16-17 when they sign up. In order to message others, they will need to switch to another sharing option. When existing accounts who have never used DMs before use the feature for the first time, they will receive a prompt asking them to review and confirm their privacy settings. We have improved our current messaging protections, including disabling messaging for accounts under 16 and not allowing images or videos in messages.

Decide who can see your TikToks
In addition to the fun of creating a TikTok, it is just as important to consider who will share your video. This is because choosing music, effects, and transitions is worth all the effort.

With the addition of a pop-up that appears when teens under the age of 16 are ready to publish their first video, TikTok aims to help teens to understand the sharing options available to them. Their video cannot be published until a selection is made.

From now on, creators can choose who can watch their videos before posting them. By default, accounts between the ages of 13 and 15 are set to private, and private accounts can choose whether to share their content with Followers or Friends, since ‘Everyone’ is turned off. Stitch and Duet are also disabled for accounts under 16.

Select who has access to your public videos
Teenagers aged 16-17 can also choose the most convenient download option with TikTok’s help because they are giving additional context to how downloads work. The first time they turn on the feature, the pop-up will prompt them to confirm that choice before their videos can be downloaded by others. Under 16 year old accounts are permanently disabled from downloading content.

A mindful approach to push notifications
By using features such as Screen Time Management, TikTok promotes the well-being of its community members and supports their well-being, which can be enabled by either account holders or by their parents via Family Pairing. Besides offering the Youth Portal, a bullying prevention guide, and other features that support youth wellbeing,

TikTok will be making changes that reduce the amount of time the younger teens are able to receive push notifications. 13 to 15-year-olds will no longer receive push notifications from 9pm, and 16 to 17-year-olds will not receive push notifications at 10pm.

To learn more about our efforts to support youth and families, you can read our Guardian’s Guide. Let’s get our younger users on board TikTok and let them enjoy a well-protected, safe online platform to explore their endless creativity . Download the TikTok app for free via the Apple Store, Google Play Store and Huawei AppGallery, and get creating.