Italy orders TikTok to block profiles of dubious age after girl's death

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The entity that deals with the protection of personal data in Italy has ordered the immediate blocking of the accounts of those users who are not certain that they are under 13 years of age, after the death of a 10 year old girl in a challenge. The agency (GPDP) ordered on Friday night that the use of data be blocked "for the moment until February 15 of the profiles of those users whose age information is not available.

The minimum age to access the popular video platform is 13 years old, according to its conditions. Last December, the Italian GPDP had reproached TikTok for its scant attention to the protection of minors and the ease with which they evaded the age limit, as well as the little transparency of the information offered to users.

The entity took this measure while waiting to receive a response from the social platform and to ensure the immediate protection of minors who use it in Italy. The decision comes after a 10 year old girl from the Sicilian city of Palermo (south) died of suffocation by tying a belt around her neck while participating in a challenge on that social network.

The girl, Antonella Sicomero, was discovered by her five year old sister in the bathroom at home with a bathrobe belt tied around her neck and a radiator.

Apparently he was participating in a Tik Tok challenge known as a blackout challenge in which the person who can last the longest without breathing wins. Sicomero suffered a faint and later a coma. She was transferred to the Giovanni Di Cristina children's hospital in Palermo, where the doctors informed the family that it was unlikely that the young woman would wake up and where they were offered the possibility of donating the organs.

Finally last Thursday her death was declared.

The authorities are investigating the causes of the event.