Kyrgyzstan bans TikTok over children’s health concerns

Kyrgyzstan's culture ministry officials have requested that digital authorities block access to TikTok over concerns that the video platform is "negatively affecting children's mental development and health".

In its petition to the Ministry of Digital Development, the Ministry of Culture said it was concerned about the uncontrolled availability of harmful content and the lack of age restrictions on the app.

“TikTok immerses the user in a virtual world of short clips and after watching them, teenagers try to imitate some videos, some of which can be life-threatening,” the ministry said. “Children's psyche is still evolving, they are just forming. Such content can cause addiction and negatively affect the emotional state of the younger generation."

The move against TikTok is in line with broader trends in Kyrgyzstan, where the government is pursuing increased censorship in what it claims is an effort to maintain social and political stability. Earlier this month, the Attorney General's Office announced it was seeking the closure of an independent media outlet on the grounds that its critical coverage of current events is stoking emotional discontent among the public.

Culture ministry officials insist the call to block TikTok doesn't come out of the blue.

In statements to media, Deputy Culture Minister Chyngyz Esengul said as many as 18 non-governmental and civil society groups had pleaded with the government to block the app.

Kyrgyzstan is certainly not an isolated case in the fight against TikTok

As reported by The New York Times, lawmakers in a number of Western countries, including the United States and Canada, are seeking to restrict access to the Chinese-owned platform. In most of those cases, the formal rationale for banning TikTok stems from concerns that the app owner may be making user data available to Chinese government agencies.

Similar reasoning has supported restrictions elsewhere. India banned TikTok in June 2020, citing the need to protect the country's "sovereignty and integrity" and "state security and public order".

The Kyrgyz, who has a position close to Beijing, does not make the ban a political issue. Indeed, there was no concern about the fact that Chinese agencies collect data and information through apps. Indeed, Kyrgyzstan in 2019 authorized a facial recognition system via closed circuit remote control whose data is processed in China.

At the time, human rights groups expressed concerns that the Chinese company implementing the project – China National Electronic Import and Export Corporation – would have full access to the data used by the surveillance technology. No explanation has ever been given as to how much this arrangement would actually share in terms of data.