Instagram began introducing new restrictive accounts yesterday for users under the age of 18 to address growing concerns about social media’s impact on youth. The overhaul is estimated to affect over 100 million accounts worldwide and comes as parent company Meta faces a lawsuit from 33 states alleging its platforms harm children’s mental health.
New accounts for minors in the US, the UK, Canada, and Australia will be set to private automatically while existing accountswill transitionto privateover the next 60 days. Default settings will limit who can contact minors and what content minors can see. Upcoming features (see here) include silencing notifications from 10 pm to 7 am and prompting users to close the app after 60 minutes. Users aged 16 and above can adjust their settings manually. Meta will introduce these accounts in the European Union later this year and in other countries in 2025.
Meta is also testing age verification processes, including using AI to prevent minors from misrepresenting their age. See stats on social media use among teens here.
Instagram’s Teen Overhaul added by Staff on
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