The news: TikTok will tighten its age verification process in Europe amid heightened regulatory pressure, Reuters reports.

• TikTok plans to introduce new age-checking technology in the EU to detect and remove accounts for users under 13. Flagged accounts will be reviewed for violations by human moderators.
• The move follows a pilot test in the UK that caused thousands of accounts to be removed.

The trend: Global authorities are cracking down on platform processes for verifying user ages.

• Australia enacted the first global social media ban for children under 16 in December. Similar moves are being made in other countries, with Denmark hoping to ban social media for children under 15 and the European Parliament broadly pushing for stricter age limits on social platforms.
• TikTok is facing heat in the US, where it is requesting a Delaware judge dismiss a lawsuit filed by parents of children who died performing trending challenge videos. The suit claims that TikTok’s algorithm promotes harmful content to children, some below 13.
• Several US states have proposed or passed youth safety laws targeting minors’ social media use; Florida recently secured partial approval for an under-14 social media ban.
• At the federal level, California’s Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act (SB 976) is under review and would ban algorithmically driven addictive feeds for users under 18 without parental consent.

Tighter restrictions on minors’ social media use has widespread support. US adults overwhelmingly support federal rules on social media usage like preventing platforms from collecting children’s personal data (74%), requiring parental consent to set up accounts (71%), and requiring age verification for all users (61%), per CivicScience.

Implications for marketers: The push toward stricter age verification processes globally presents a challenge in reaching emerging consumer groups.

Building brand affinity at a young age is critical for those seeking lasting customer loyalty. Advertisers who rely on platforms like TikTok could struggle to build long-term audiences, while platforms with dedicated content geared toward children, like YouTube Kids, could become more appealing for those looking to get young audiences in their ecosystem.