European Commission orders TikTok to preserve all data on Romanian election

The European Commission is increasing its scrutiny of TikTok over its role in the Romanian presidential election.

Today, the Commission ordered the video-sharing app to “preserve internal documents and information” on the workings of its recommender system and how it handles manipulation risks. TikTok also has to store data on breaches of its ban on political advertising.

The order encompasses all national elections — not just the Romanian ones — and runs until March. That time frame includes data on the upcoming German election.

The new step follows the release of the declassification of Romanian intelligence documents on Wednesday, which alleged that paid influencers had boosted the account of ultranationalist Călin Georgescu in the lead-up to the first round of the Romanian presidential election.

The decision should help “investigators establish the facts,” said Henna Virkkunen, the European Commission’s new tech chief, and adds to the earlier set of questions that the Commission sent to the company on Friday.

The Commission emphasized that it hadn’t decided yet whether TikTok had breached the EU’s content-moderation law, the Digital Services Act, and that the request to store data and evidence was meant to monitor compliance.

TikTok is overseen by the European Commission’s tech department under the DSA. Brussels has gradually scrutinized the platform over the past two weeks after being pressed by Romanian regulators.

However, Brussels is also on guard to prevent interference in national elections. In today’s press release, it repeated that stance and said it did “not address the Romanian electoral process.”

Brussels is also calling for the help of the capitals: On Friday, the EU executive will meet with the 27 authorities overseeing DSA enforcement in member countries.

“We have already been cooperating with the Commission and will continue to do so,” TikTok said. “We look forward to establishing the facts in light of some of the speculation and inaccurate reports we have seen.”

This article has been updated to include a comment from TikTok.