Instagram last year introduced new security measures and parental features to give more control over their feeds and profiles. Now, the Meta-owned photo and video sharing company is limiting sensitive content to new teenage users by default on the platform. With the latest update, Instagram account holders under 16 will be kept in its filtered version of the app, unless they manually change the setting. Additionally, Instagram is testing a new way that allows teens to review and update their safety and privacy settings.
Through A Blog post On Thursday, Instagram announced that it is expanding its sensitive content defaults for younger users. Sensitive content controls have only two options for teens — “Standard” and “Low.” According to the company, Instagram users under the age of 16 will default to “low” status. For existing users, the company will send a notification encouraging them to select the “less” option.
With the latest update, Instagram will filter sensitive content on search, explore, hashtag pages, reels, feed recommendations and suggested accounts for younger users.
Conversely, users over the age of 18 will have access to “Standard,” “Less,” and “More” options, with the last option allowing them to view more sensitive content or accounts than the default settings.
In addition, Instagram will ask users under 18 on the app to review the settings to update security and privacy settings. With this, teens can limit who can share their content, who can direct message and contact them, and what kind of content their followers can see. The company will also show prompts asking teens to review how they manage the time they spend on Instagram.
All these new measures are being taken with the aim of creating a safe environment for the youth on Instagram. The company introduced a sensitivity filter in July last year that lets people set limits on how much potentially sensitive content they can see on their “Explore” page. Later in August, it began prompting users to fill in their birthday details to understand how old everyone is on the platform and to prevent inappropriate content from appearing on their feeds for young people.
In March this year, Instagram launched parental controls that let parents track how much time their kids are spending on Instagram. With the help of Instagram monitoring tools, parents can see which accounts their kids follow and set time limits on how much time their kids spend on the app.
