Brazil Fines TikTok’s Owner $29.9m Over Children’s Data, Including Guest Sessions
Brazil’s National Data Protection Agency fined ByteDance 153.7 million reais on Tuesday, according to the Associated Press, and found that TikTok processed children’s data without a lawful basis in logged-out browsing as well as in accounts.
August 25, 2026 – 9:55 pm
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Brazil has fined TikTok’s owner over the way it handled children’s data, and the ruling covers people who never had an account.
The National Data Protection Agency imposed a penalty of 153.7 million reais on ByteDance on Tuesday, worth about $29.9m. It cited irregularities in the processing of data belonging to children and adolescents.
TikTok breached data privacy law across both logged-in accounts and guest browsing sessions, the regulator said in its ruling. It collected and processed young users’ personal information without a valid legal basis or adequate safeguards.
Mauricio Savarese reported the decision for the Associated Press. Agence France-Presse carried the agency’s figures.
The guest-session finding is the part that extends most child-safety enforcement to date, which has typically focused on accounts. Regulators ask how old a user said they were, what the platform did to check, and what settings applied afterwards.
Brazil has gone further. Its regulator found that the data problem existed for people browsing without signing in at all.
That reading does not depend on age verification working. It treats the collection itself as the breach, whoever is at the other end.
What TikTok has to do:
- Delete the data it collected in violation of the rules.
- Produce a plan for protecting minors better.
TikTok has committed to a compliance plan, the agency said. The platform will have to apply stricter privacy settings automatically to accounts belonging to under-16s. It must also strengthen parental supervision systems and put in place stricter content filters.
ByteDance has 10 days to appeal. It did not comment to the AP and did not respond to AFP.
What the ruling does not do:
- Suspend TikTok, block it, or restrict what it publishes.
The remedies all concern data and settings. That is a narrower action than the one the first lady called for, and a narrower one than the country has taken before against a platform. It is also the kind of order a company can comply with and keep operating, which is why the appeal is worth watching rather than assuming.
The same regulator moved on Discord this month.
This is the second time in three weeks that Brazil’s data protection agency has acted against a platform over child safety. It told Discord to suspend livestreaming after the death of a 13-year-old girl. Discord appealed on Monday and the agency has that appeal under review.
The two wire accounts differ slightly on that order. AFP describes the agency as having ordered the suspension, and the AP describes it as a recommendation.
An agency that was issuing recommendations three weeks ago is issuing fines now, whichever word applies.
Brazil has been building to this. A recent Brazilian law requires platforms to link accounts held by under-16s to a parent’s account, and to verify how old users are.
The country has form on enforcement. X was blocked in Brazil for 40 days in 2024 until it complied with Supreme Court orders to remove accounts accused of spreading disinformation.
Regulators there have also had to deal with newe