Turkiye: Issued decision in investigation into TikTok over insufficient data protection measures including TRY 1.75 million fine

On 1 March 2023, the Turkish Personal Data Protection Board issued Decision No 2023/134 concerning the investigation into TikTok over its data protection measures and imposed a fine of TRY 1.75 million against the company. The Board found that TikTok failed to adopt measures to ensure an appropriate level of security over the data it collected in order to prevent the unlawful processing of personal data. In particular, the Board found that TikTok’s privacy policy and terms of service failed to provide clear and specific information about the purposes of collection and processing of personal data and did not request separate consent for the disclosure or processing of data, including for cookie profiling purposes. In addition, TikTok did not provide users with a translation to Turkish of its privacy policy. Furthermore, the Board found that the app had collected the personal information of children under the age of 13 without parental consent and did not adopt appropriate measures to restrict access to the data of minors.