Instagram to Enforce New Safety Measures, Making Millions of Teen Accounts Private

Instagram has announced significant changes aimed at increasing the safety of its teenage users, automatically converting millions of accounts into private profiles under new “teen account” settings. The update, revealed on Tuesday, marks Instagram’s most comprehensive effort to date in protecting young users from harmful content and interactions on the platform.

The changes come nearly three years after the release of the “Facebook Papers,” which highlighted the dangers Instagram poses to younger audiences. In response, Instagram’s parent company, Meta, has introduced a series of measures designed to enhance parental supervision and restrict access to potentially harmful content for users under the age of 18.

Under the new settings, all teen accounts—both new and existing—will automatically be set to private. Users aged 16 and 17 will be able to manually adjust their privacy settings, but those aged 13 to 15 will require parental approval to make changes. Additionally, teens will be placed in Instagram’s strictest content control settings, limiting their exposure to sensitive material, including posts related to cosmetic procedures and other age-inappropriate content.

This update builds on previous safety tools introduced by Meta, such as “take a break” reminders and filters for harmful content like posts about eating disorders. Instagram will now also restrict who can send direct messages to teens, limiting contact to people the user already follows. The platform will automatically remind teens to take breaks if they spend more than an hour on the app and will enter “sleep mode” during nighttime hours, muting notifications.

The new features, which will initially roll out in the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Australia, are expected to be available in more countries over the coming months. Meta has also introduced new parental supervision features, allowing parents to monitor accounts their teens have messaged, set time limits, and restrict usage during certain hours.

Despite these efforts, Meta has faced ongoing criticism for its handling of teenage users, including accusations that it hasn’t done enough to prevent young people from lying about their age to bypass safety settings. The company says it is working on artificial intelligence tools to detect when users may be falsifying their age.

Meta developed these changes with input from its Safety Advisory Council, youth advisors, and feedback from parents, teens, and government officials.