TikTok is imposing age restrictions on some of its beauty filters to address concerns about the impact they have on the mental health of teenage users. Some of the changes coming “in the coming weeks” include preventing those under 18 from using certain appearance-altering effects, and expanding filter descriptions to specify what the filters adjust when applied.

The press release states that age restrictions do not apply to filter effects that are “designed to be obvious and funny,” such as adding animal ears or comically exaggerating certain features. The change is likely to address beautification effects like Bold Glamor, which give users smoother skin, longer lashes and slimmer faces – which can be harder to detect.

Dr. Nikki Soo, TikTok’s Safety and Well-being Public Policy Lead for Europe, confirmed this The edge that age restrictions for appearance altering effects will be implemented worldwide.

The changes are being introduced in response to a report from the children’s nonprofit Internet Matters, which found that “beautifying filters have contributed to a distorted worldview that normalizes sophisticated images.” Children were often unable to tell when images had been altered and faced “significant social pressure” to look a certain way online, according to the report.

New resources will also be introduced “in the coming weeks” in 13 unspecified European countries, connecting users who report content due to concerns about suicide, self-harm, hate and harassment to relevant local helplines. According to TikTok, the platform now has more than 175 million monthly active users in Europe.

“There is no end point when it comes to safety and security, and we will continue to learn from our community, collaborate with experts and strive to do even better,” Christine Grahn, TikTok’s head of European public policy, said on LinkedIn. “If our users don’t feel safe, they won’t bring their true selves to TikTok and the platform simply wouldn’t be the same.”

TikTok is also exploring new machine learning technologies that can detect accounts created by users under the age of 13 – the minimum age allowed to use the platform. The company says users who have had their accounts deleted can appeal “if they think we made a mistake,” and that it removes about six million accounts worldwide every year that don’t meet the minimum age requirement.

Update, November 27: Added confirmation from TikTok about global availability.