Around 16 per cent of British toddlers aged three and four use TikTok, a report by Ofcom has revealed.
Despite the app being limited for use by those aged 13 or older, the report found that a growing number of children are regularly using TikTok – including almost one third of children aged five to seven-years-old.
For kids aged between eight and 11, TikTok was the most popular social media platform with one in every three people in the age group having an account, closely followed by YouTube at 27 per cent.
For older children, they were most likely to have an Instagram profile with 55 per cent of those aged between 12 and 15 admitting to having an account despite the photo-sharing app’s age limit of at least 13-years-old.
On underage social media use, one 12-year-old girl told Ofcom: “I have no clue what the restriction is for Instagram is. I could have it quite young because I could make a private account… For TikTok and Snapchat I think I put in a fake birthday because I was allowed to have it.”
The report suggested the app’s popularity could be due to its quick, short-form content which is linked to using multiple screen usage, resulting in more children finding difficulty in focusing on one online activity at a time.
Only 4 per cent of kids aged between three and 17 said they never do anything else while watching TV, with most reporting they’re unable to watch a film or other long-form content without using multiple devices at the same time.
A TikTok spokeperson told The Independent: “Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our community, especially young people.
“TikTok is strictly a 13-plus platform and we have processes in place to enforce our minimum age requirements, both at the point of sign up and through the continuous proactive removal of suspected underage accounts from the platform.”
On concealing their lives online, around two thirds of eight to 11-year-olds (64 per cent) admitted to multiple social media accounts or “finstas” (fake or concealed Instagram accounts) to hide aspects of their online lives from friends, family or peers.
Not only this, but more than one third of children (35 per cent) admitted to restricting their parent or guardian’s access to their online life through surfing incognito mode, deleting their browsing history or evading online parental controls.
While over half of 13 to 17-year-olds said being online is generally good for their mental health and wellbeing, one in five disagreed.
“All our users have to pass through a compulsory age gate to sign up for an account,” added a TikTok spokesperson. “If they are under 13, they can’t register. Unlike some other platforms, our age gate is neutrally designed: that means we don’t indicate to prospective new users at the point of sign up what the minimum age requirement is.
“If someone does not meet our minimum age requirement, we suspend their ability to attempt to re-create an account using a different date of birth.”
They added that TikTok has also introduced tools to safeguard those aged between 13 and 18 on the app, such as setting their accounts to private by default.
