Social media platform TikTok has announced that the app is taking even more measures to keep young children and teenagers safe by automatically disabling direct messages for certain users and turning the lights out on notifications past a certain time, depending on age. 

One of the first major changes the company is making is limiting the amount of alerts and notifications it sends out to its young users. Starting 12 August, users of the app aged 15 or younger will stop receiving notification alerts after 9PM, whereas 16 to 17 year olds will get beeps up until 10PM. 

The move isn't being made so much as to help the youngins of the world sleep easier, but rather an attempt at combating late-night bullying, which in recent times has become more and more of an epidemic in online communities - especially those mostly inhabited by teenage users. 

Some of the other, perhaps more drastic changes the company is making, is the automatic privacy settings enabled on accounts for users under the age of 15. Those youth accounts will now be set to private by default, meaning their videos won't be algorithmically shown on anybody else's For You Page (FYP) besides the accounts they specifically enable them for. Furthermore, those accounts won't have access to the Stitch or Duet features, so sorry kids, no recreating your favourite dance you just saw on your FYP until you're a bit older. 

A few other tidbits include disabling video downloading on teenage accounts (the app will require users 16 and up to review their privacy settings before allowing other users to download their videos), and asking older teenage users to review their direct message settings when they first create an account on the app. 

The company stressed there was "no finish line" to the amount of child safety features they plan on implementing, so it's safe to assume this won't be the first time the explosively popular video app makes a few security changes here and there. 

If you've been living under a rock these past couple of years and aren't sure what TikTok is all about, you can read everything you need to know about it right here.