The European Union’s new Digital Services Act (DSA) aimed to shield children from targeted advertising on social media, but a recent study reveals a significant loophole. Despite the ban on profiling minors for advertising purposes, TikTok continues to serve highly personalized commercial content to teenage users—primarily through undisclosed ads disguised as organic posts. This means teens are being exposed to marketing tailored to their interests, even though the platform technically complies with the law by limiting formal advertising.
The DSA’s Flawed Definition of ‘Advertising’
The DSA defines “advertising” narrowly, focusing only on paid promotions purchased directly through the platform. This leaves a gaping hole for influencer marketing and other forms of promotional content where creators and brands push products without mandatory disclosure labels. TikTok, and potentially other platforms, are exploiting this ambiguity to bypass the new regulations.
Researchers from the Kempelen Institute of Intelligent Technologies in Slovakia used automated “sock puppet” accounts simulating teens (16-17 years old) and young adults (20-21 years old) to observe TikTok’s algorithm firsthand. Over 10 days, these bots scrolled through the For You feed, recording the types of videos served to them.
Undisclosed Ads Dominate Teen Feeds
The results are stark: nearly 19% of the videos watched by the teen accounts were advertisements. Alarmingly, 56% of these ads were undisclosed, meaning creators and brands did not use the required disclosure labels. Formal, platform-purchased ads shown to minors were scarce and showed no personalized targeting—but the majority of commercial content slipped under the radar.
What’s more, the undisclosed ads were aggressively tailored to the teens’ inferred interests. For example, a 16-year-old girl interested in beauty was shown ads matching that interest 92.1% of the time. This hidden profiling was five to eight times stronger than the level of targeting permitted for adult advertising. Minors encountered undisclosed ads in 84% of cases, compared to 49% for adults.
The Problem With “Compliance”
TikTok insists it is doing everything it can to comply with the law, and technically, that statement holds. The platform does not profile formal ads to minors. However, as researcher Sára Soľárová points out, “the disclosed ads represent a small proportion of the total commercial content on the app.” The issue isn’t technical non-compliance; it’s a systemic exploitation of regulatory loopholes.
Catalina Goanta at Utrecht University emphasizes that regulators must broaden their definition of advertising. Influencer marketing has traditionally been viewed too narrowly, and undisclosed ads represent a clear harm to consumers. The current framework allows platforms to deliver highly targeted commercial content by inferring user preferences without triggering regulatory oversight.
This issue raises questions about whether the DSA, in its current form, can effectively protect children from manipulative marketing tactics. The law needs to evolve alongside the platform, expanding its definition of advertising to include all forms of commercial influence.
