TikTok in the dock over two shocking deaths
ISLAMABAD/ROME: Two shocking deaths, one in Pakistan and another in Italy, have yet again dragged the hugely popular app TikTok in the spotlight, sparking global outrage and calls for a deeper review of the social impact of such social media tools.
In Pakistan’s Rawalpindi, a young man was hit and killed by a train while being filmed walking along the tracks for a TikTok stunt, police and rescue officials said on Saturday. The accident happened on Friday in the Shah Khalid neighbourhood of Rawalpindi city, near the capital Islamabad.
Hamza Naveed, 18, was walking next to the tracks while a friend filmed him, Raja Rafaqat Zaman, a spokesperson for the local rescue agency, told AFP.
“The moving train hit him while he was posing for a video and walking on the railway track,” Zaman said. Rescue workers rushed to the site, he said, but the young man was already dead.
Friends of the young man told rescue workers he was posing for the video to post it on TikTok and his other social media accounts, Zaman said. A police official at the local station confirmed the accident and other details.
Taking selfies and making videos for social media is wildly popular in Pakistan, as in other countries, with many youngsters using the posts to update their Facebook, Twitter and TikTok accounts.
In Italy, meanwhile, the country’s data privacy watchdog ordered TikTok on Friday to block the accounts of any users inside Italy whose age it could not verify following the death of a 10-year-old girl who had been using the Chineseowned app.
In a statement, the regulator said that although TikTok had committed to ban registration for children aged under 13, it was nonetheless easy to circumvent this rule.
As a result, it said TikTok had to block unverified user accounts until at least February 15 awaiting further information. A spokeswoman for TikTok in Italy said the company was analysing the communication received from the authority.
The ruling came after a girl died of asphyxiation in Palermo, Sicily, in a case that has shocked Italy. Her parents said she had been participating in a so-called blackout challenge on TikTok, putting a belt around her neck and holding her breath while recording herself on her phone.