We want children and young people to embrace the internet to learn, share, collaborate and participate in civic life with free expression. We also need to ensure that when they do so they are kept safe. When it comes to dealing with young people’s personal information it is important to be mindful that the most valuable commodity in the evolving world of technology and digital information is data. More than this, data is inextricably linked to the individual identity of its owner. We therefore have absolute responsibility to ensure that when young people share their data with us, we treat it with the care and respect it warrants.
TikTok is a social media app for creating and sharing short videos. It offers users easy to use in-app visual editing and sound effects to produce imaginative memes and creative content that mostly feature lip-sync, comedy and talent videos of between 3 – 15 seconds long or looped videos of up to 60 seconds long.
TikTok allows users to have private accounts, but the social nature of the app and the rapid success of other TikTokkers ‘going viral’ is a huge enticement for young people to use the app in ways which may not always be positive.