The rapid and unstoppable rise of TikTok, one of the most preferred social media platforms by young people, has reached alarming levels for many people. A study conducted in the USA revealed how dangerous using TikTok is, especially for children. On TikTok, which has no age restrictions, there is no obstacle for 13-year-olds to watch videos that encourage alcohol and drugs or have sexual content.
Wall Street Journal, one of the most established newspapers in America, revealed that the TikTok algorithm recommends sexual content, alcohol or drug-encouraging content even to child users between the ages of 13-15.
Within the scope of the investigation conducted by the Wall Street Journal, a search of a bot account programmed for 13-year-olds showed that many content harmful to children, including two pornographic ones, was watched.
IT experts say that there are sexual contents on the personalized search page, and if you click on them, you are directed to similar videos, regardless of your age, and warn families about this danger.
There Is No Filter For Children
In the TikTok application, the same videos are still recommended to all accounts, regardless of whether they are adults or children, and there is no child filter. TikTok administrators have still not managed to develop a filter for children. Although the bot account used was limited to the age range of 13-15, the artificial intelligence-supported algorithm presented more inappropriate content each time.
It was stated that the bot accounts used displayed a total of 569 drug-encouraging content and more than 100 erotic and pornographic content.
Statement from TikTok
“Although my bio says I am over 18, there is really no way to check this,” the Wall Street Journal's report said. There is no obstacle for a child who is not 18 years old to introduce himself as an adult to the application.
Newspaper reporters reached out to the TikTok spokesperson and asked questions. Suffice to say that the majority did not violate the regulations, the TikTok spokesperson argued that inappropriate videos were removed and the distribution of other videos was also restricted to prevent the spread of these contents.
It ranks second after WhatsApp
According to 2019 data, the TikTok application, which was downloaded 711 million times, became the second most downloaded application in the world after WhatsApp. According to statistics, it is the seventh highest-earning application in the world in terms of revenue.
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Stage Media
13-09-2021 14:44:50