Meta, Instagram’s parent company, is introducing comprehensive changes to give parents more control over how their young children use the app. In the future, teenagers will automatically be assigned to “teen accounts” that will make contact and the content displayed more restrictive. An innovative step that puts the protection of young people at the forefront.
For users under 16, the safety cage remains closed unless parents relax the measures. Meta relies heavily on artificial intelligence to identify teenagers who give a false age. Nick Clegg, Meta’s head of policy, sees this as a balanced solution between the rights of young people, parental supervision and the responsibility of social media companies. Despite the expected decline in usage, Meta hopes to strengthen parents’ trust in the safety measures.
The main protection mechanisms for teen accounts include a night mode that mutes notifications from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. and sends automatic replies to direct messages. Furthermore, teenagers receive a notification after 60 minutes of use asking them to take a break. New followers must be accepted manually to protect privacy. In addition, sensitive content such as cosmetic procedures or violence as well as offensive words are filtered out of comments.
Parents can also check who their children have chatted with in the last seven days, but without seeing the content of the messages. They also have the option of setting a hard time limit for daily use or blocking access for certain periods of time. These new features will initially be implemented in the USA, Great Britain, Canada and Australia and are to be introduced in the EU by the end of the year. A worldwide implementation is planned for next year, including on other meta platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Threads.
The new AI systems will also evaluate profile information and interactions to identify teens who misrepresent their age. Users who are identified will then be automatically moved to teen accounts, with an opportunity to correct any errors.
Nick Clegg hopes that this move will spark a broader discussion about parental control mechanisms across different apps. Despite repeated criticism of the lack of security for young users, Meta is sending a clear message with these measures.
