European Commissioner for the Internal Market and Technology Henna Virkkunen has expressed support for TikTok’s newly introduced measures aimed at preventing foreign interference ahead of Romania’s presidential election re-run.
During an Internal Market and Consumer Protection meeting on April 7, Virkkunen provided updates on the recent actions taken to address election risks and protect democratic discourse under the European Union’s Digital Services Act.
She said in response to the TikTok proceedings started in December 2024, the social media giant had announced it would implement numerous changes to improve its system regarding elections.
“In the context of the upcoming Romanian elections, I welcome the changes,” Virkkunen said.
“This includes better detection and labeling of political accounts and more Romanian language experts, and an additional 120 experts to the Romanian election task force working especially on covert influence campaigns and advertising integrity,” she added.
She also welcomed the activation of the EU’s Code of Practices for a rapid response system, which began as of April 7.
Virkkunen stated it would continue to closely monitor the situation in Romania and that it had extended its “data retention order” to TikTok.
That meant Chinese-owned TikTok must preserve data related to any potential risks to EU elections and civic discourse, ensuring the availability of evidence should the EC launch further investigations into compliance with the DSA.
Virkkunen’s comments followed alleged foreign interference in the first round of the Romanian presidential election held in November 2024, which Romania’s Constitutional Court invalidated the following month.
The court cited intelligence reports claiming that Russia used social media, especially TikTok, to support independent candidate Călin Georgescu, a nationalist who won the first round of voting.
The court subsequently ordered a re-run of the election in May, with Georgescu barred from standing as a candidate.
George Simion, chairman of the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians and Anamaria Gavrilă of the Party of Young People, have announced they will run for the Romanian presidency instead of rejected candidate Călin Georgescu. https://t.co/wQl6XuOjJ0
— Brussels Signal (@brusselssignal) March 13, 2025
