Overview
- The European Commission on Friday issued formal preliminary charges under the Digital Services Act saying TikTok’s 'For You' recommender repeatedly serves similar videos that can lead users into 'rabbit holes' and worsen sadness, anxiety and body‑image harms.
- Brussels told TikTok to change the feed’s design by giving more weight to users’ explicit preferences, stopping the use of viewing time as a recommendation signal, improving the ease of user controls, and running regular tests of the algorithm.
- TikTok can now access the Commission’s files and respond before a final decision; if breaches are confirmed the company could face fines of up to 6% of global annual turnover next year.
- The action updates a two‑year EU probe that earlier flagged addictive design and weak child protections, and it follows parallel scrutiny and legal pressure in other places such as a September U.S. settlement with Alabama over teen safeguards.
- If enforced, the order could force platforms to redesign core recommendation logic rather than only surface features, which may reduce repetitive harmful feeds for users but could also prompt legal fights and wider rules for other social apps.