New Instagram 'Teen Accounts' Restrict Young Users to Age-Appropriate Content, Aims to Address Parents' Biggest Concerns

Instagram has previously attempted to limit teens from viewing sensitive content from their feeds. Recently, Meta revived a new initiative to pave the way for "teen accounts."

This comes just over a month after the photo-sharing app revealed that it will be making some improvements with the aim of protecting young people on the site.

The new "teen account" settings will force millions of teen accounts to be private and limit the type of content they can see.

Teens' Increasing Concerns at Instagram for Safety

The new change by Instagram's management shall help further protect users below 18 years of age. The change aimed at the new "teen account" settings will mean that these changes will immediately apply to all new and current users under the age of 18.

In consequence, teenagers, who are 13-15 years old, would have to receive their parents' permission if they want to set new default levels; 16-17-year-old individuals would be able to manually change their privacy levels independently, according to CNN.

These changes augment Instagram's current features for supporting teen's well-being like filters, usage duration, and "Take a Break" suggestions. These updates are aimed at making teens using the platform safe with restricted access to content that may be dangerous such as posts encouraging eating disorders or cosmetic surgery.

Rising Dangers for Teens

The new restrictions are coming, however after approximately three years of the expose of the so-called "Facebook Papers" that outlined negative impacts of social media apps like Instagram on the health and safety of youngsters.

Of course, Meta, which owns Instagram, has introduced many safety measures in the past, but it has been criticized constantly for not being enough protective of its under-aged audience.

This pressure increased after Arturo Bejar, a former employee at the Meta company testified in front of a Senate subcommittee that the company he used to work for, had dismissed warnings on how its platform was dangerous to teenagers. However, various lawsuits have accused Zuckerberg, the chief executive officer of the organization, of halting teen well-being programs and the firm continued to permit the engagement accounts with users under 13 years.

In response, Meta's latest measures focus on addressing the concerns of parents and regulators. According to Meta, these new settings aim to help parents manage who their teens interact with, monitor the content they're exposed to, and ensure their time on the platform is well spent.

"Parents everywhere are thinking about these issues,"Meta's director of global safety, Antigone Davi told The Guardian Australia.

Enhanced Privacy and Content Restrictions for Teens

One of the most notable changes is that all accounts for users under 18 will now default to private settings. Teen users will only be able to receive messages from people they are already connected with, and tagging in photos or mentions in comments will be restricted to users they follow. This shift limits teens' interactions with strangers, reducing potential risks.

In addition, teens will be placed in the most restrictive content control settings, curbing access to sensitive material, especially on the Explore page and in Reels. This includes limiting content that promotes cosmetic procedures or other potentially harmful topics.

Parental Supervision Tools Get a Boost

Instagram is also expanding its parental supervision tools, providing more control to parents and guardians. With these updates, parents can now see which accounts their teens have messaged recently, set daily time limits for Instagram use, and block the app during specific periods, such as nighttime.

This enhanced parental control is to help parents and caregivers properly monitor and regulate their children's interaction with the website making it safer for the young generation.

In addition, having reached millions of teenagers, Instagram will help them to log out after an hour of using the app and will be inactive between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m.

Facebook's AI Technology to Address Age Inaccuracies

In additional steps, Meta wants to bring AI techniques to identify the teen accounts that may have included a fake adult age during the sign-up process. This technology is to prevent cases of teenagers from avoiding safety constraints by providing fake ages when signing up for new accounts.

Global Rollout of Instagram's Teen Protections

The new settings will first be released in English-speaking countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia, for the rest of the world in the next couple of months. These features were also developed with the help of online safety experts and youth advisors who are members of the Safety Advisory Council for Meta's young users.