TikTok faces EU fine over “For You” feed ‘rabbit hole’ effect

What happened

The European Commission has preliminarily found that TikTok breaks EU online safety rules by repeatedly recommending similar videos, potentially trapping users in harmful content loops. ByteDance is an Internet company based in Beijing, and its products and services include TikTok.

However, the Commission found that these features do little to stop the platform from recommending similar harmful content. The findings, published on Friday, follow a long-running investigation under the Digital Services Act (DSA).

Europe The Commission says the app keeps pushing harmful videos; owner ByteDance faces a fine of up to 6%. The Commission says TikTok’s For You feed keeps recommending videos similar to those users have already watched or liked.

This can happen even when the content deals with sensitive subjects such as loneliness, weight loss or body image. The Commission said TikTok had failed to properly assess these risks or take sufficient steps to reduce them.

TikTok already offers some controls, including a button that lets users mark videos as “not interested”. Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s executive vice-president for tech sovereignty, said TikTok’s recommendation system can lead users “down rabbit holes they cannot easily escape from”. These are preliminary findings, not a final ruling.