TikTok settles second addiction case, leaving Meta and Snap to face a jury alone

Irish court tells regulator to reconsider TikTok’s China data-transfer ban

Tòa án tối cao Ireland giữ nguyên phạt 530 triệu euro cho TikTok vì chuyển dữ liệu người dùng châu Âu sang Trung Quốc vi phạm GDPR, nhưng yêu cầu cơ quan quản lý xem xét lại lệnh cấm chuyển dữ liệu trong tương lai để tạo điều kiện hoạt động cho TikTok. Vụ việc làm nổi bật căng thẳng giữa vai trò "thiên đường công nghệ" và trách nhiệm quản lý của Ireland trong bối cảnh nhiệm kỳ Chủ tịch Hội đồng EU mới.

Một lập trình viên cần đọc bài này để hiểu rõ cách GDPR và các quy định bảo mật dữ liệu ảnh hưởng đến thiết kế hệ thống xử lý dữ liệu quốc tế, đặc biệt khi phải đối mặt với các vấn đề về chuyển dữ liệu sang nước ngoài như trong trường hợp TikTok.

US House passes kids online safety package, setting up a Senate fight

The US House passed the Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act 267-117, a sweeping youth online safety package that bundles over a dozen bills including the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA). The legislation would require default privacy settings for minors, expand parental controls, block private messaging for children under 13, impose safeguards on AI chatbots and gaming platforms, and mandate age verification on pornographic sites. However, the House stripped out the duty-of-care provision — the clause that would impose legal liability on platforms for harms to minors — which Senate sponsors consider essential. Senator Blumenthal declared the House version 'dead in the Senate,' setting up a legislative clash. Civil liberties groups have long opposed the duty-of-care clause, fearing it would incentivize platforms to over-remove lawful content. Meta has been lobbying against liability provisions amid thousands of active child-harm lawsuits. The bill's fate now hinges on whether the two chambers can reconcile their disagreement over that single deleted clause.

Threads adds new features to Live Chats as it expands access

Meta's Threads is expanding its Live Chats feature with several updates: translation support for global accessibility, co-host invitations (up to three per chat), host message deletion, and visual prominence testing for host messages. Access is being broadened to all 'Community Champions.' The platform also teased upcoming desktop support and pinned messages. Since launch, Live Chats has seen hundreds of daily chats with thousands of participants. Threads recently hit 500 million monthly active users and continues adding features to differentiate itself from X.

Solo-maxxing: How tech taught Gen Z to monetise being alone

Solo-maxxing — the trend of deliberately maximising time alone and treating singlehood as a lifestyle goal — is examined as a symptom of how technology has commodified solitude. The term traces its roots from 1940s game theory through incel forums to mainstream TikTok culture. Young people are retreating from dating apps due to financial costs and emotional exhaustion, with Tinder losing 7% of paying users in 2024. Algorithms reward aestheticised loneliness content, pushing creators to brand themselves around permanent solitude. The deeper concern is that the same tech ecosystem that gamified intimacy now monetises the retreat from it — and is positioning AI companions as the next step. Regulatory responses like the EU AI Act, Digital Services Act, and US state-level AI companion laws are emerging but are seen as insufficient, since they address transparency rather than the deeper question of what happens to human connection when companionship becomes frictionless and on-demand.

TikTok and YouTube cut 4.7 million under-16 accounts in Indonesia

TikTok và YouTube đã vô hiệu hóa khoảng 4,7 triệu tài khoản của người dưới 16 tuổi tại Indonesia theo quy định mới của chính phủ về gỡ bỏ tài khoản trẻ em trên nền tảng rủi ro cao. TikTok chiếm 4,1 triệu tài khoản, YouTube là 600.000, trong khi các nền tảng khác như X, Instagram và Roblox vẫn chưa công bố số liệu. Indonesia áp dụng tiêu chuẩn tuổi tương tự Na Uy, Anh và Úc, nhưng vẫn còn lo ngại về cơ chế thực thi và khả năng người dùng tái đăng ký bằng tuổi giả.

Những thay đổi luật pháp về tuổi dạy dỗ trên các nền tảng xã hội ở Indonesia sẽ giúp lập trình viên hiểu rõ hơn về cách xây dựng hệ thống kiểm soát tuổi tác an toàn, tránh rủi ro pháp lý và bảo vệ dữ liệu trẻ em trong ứng dụng của mình.

Australia’s teen social media ban works on paper, less so in practice

Six months after Australia enacted the world's first ban on social media for under-16s, a British Medical Journal study found 85% of 12–15-year-olds are still using the platforms. Two-thirds bypassed restrictions simply by entering a false age or submitting a selfie that age-detection algorithms accepted. Prime Minister Albanese has signaled intent to strengthen enforcement rather than revise the law, while the eSafety Commission is preparing legal action against Meta, TikTok, and YouTube for non-compliance. Platforms face fines up to A$49.5m. The experiment is being closely watched by governments in Europe and elsewhere, with Norway and the UK considering similar bans, though Italy's PM has cautioned such measures are easily circumvented. The core challenge exposed is that age limits relying on self-declaration or algorithmic guessing are inherently weak enforcement mechanisms.

TikTok's road to becoming a super app

TikTok is steadily expanding beyond social media toward a super app model, similar to WeChat in China. Recent moves include TikTok GO for hotel and attraction booking, a fintech license application in Brazil for payments and lending, a FIFA World Cup sports hub, casual in-app games, microdrama content, and continued growth of TikTok Shop (which hit $15.82B in U.S. sales in 2025). The strategy aims to keep users inside TikTok for discovery, commerce, entertainment, and financial services rather than switching to Google, Amazon, Spotify, or other platforms.