Meta has upgraded Instagram to better privacy and security features for users under the age of 18. Apart from this, it has also provided parental control, which means that from now on, the control of teenagers' accounts will remain with their parents.
After the new update, Instagram users under the age of 18 will be asked to close the app after every 60 minutes. Such accounts will also have a default sleep mode, which will close the app at night.
Instagram said that all Instagram accounts of users under the age of 18 will now be converted to 'Teen Accounts', which will be private by default. The advantage of a private account is that only those people can contact the user of this account who follow and allow. Apart from this, users under the age of 16 can go to default i.e. private settings only with the permission of their parents. Meta has also released a new monitoring tool that will allow parents to control their child's account and see how much time the child spends on Instagram and who he talks to.
It is worth noting that Meta, ByteDance's TikTok and Google's YouTube are already facing hundreds of cases over social media abuse. Last year, 33 US states, including California and New York, sued the company for misleading the public about the horrors of its platform.
US Senate introduced the bill:
Some major platforms allow users aged 13 and above to sign up. In July this year, the US Senate introduced two online safety bills called The Kids Safety Act and The Children and Teens Online Privacy Protection Act.