Meta’s Instagram goes PG-13 for kids using teen accounts

According to Meta, Instagram’s teen account settings will now be guided by the PG-13 guidelines adopted for movies — but whether they’ll be effective is another question, according to tech experts.

For example, teen account users are now blocked from viewing “sensitive content”, including posts that are sexually suggestive or depict physical violence. These new rules will go a step further, Meta announced Tuesday, and avoid recommending posts that contain strong language or risky stunts, as well as anything that “could encourage potentially harmful behavior.”

Teenage users will also be banned in the new rulesFrom following accounts that consistently post age-inappropriate content and view search results generated by CERThis includes words like “black blood” or “alcohol”. Teens will also be barred from opening links through Instagram that go against the platform’s updated guidelines.

“Just like you might see some suggestive content or hear some strong language in a PG-13 movie, teens can sometimes see something similar on Instagram — but we’ll continue to do everything we can to keep those incidents as rare as possible,” the company said in a statement. blog post“We recognize that no system is perfect, and we are committed to improving over time.”

Meta says it has made the changes in an effort to align its rules with an “independent standard” that parents are familiar with. The changes will begin rolling out to users in Canada, the US, the UK and Australia on Tuesday, and Meta says the rollout will be complete by the end of 2025.

teen accounts, which was first announced in September 2024 and will apply to all users under the age of 18 already Set to private as the default (meaning other users have to request to follow those accounts and view their content), can’t receive DMs from strangers and notifications will be turned off at night.

Meta has since increased restrictions on teen accounts from time to time Limiting the ability to livestream or expose explicit nudity to childrenHowever, the company says this is the most significant rule change since the teen account function was first announced.

Teen accounts can’t fix everything

According to Richard Lachman, a professor at the RTA School of Media at Metropolitan University of Toronto, the added controls are “little, too late”.

“We’re seeing some movement from the major platforms to offer things that they could have done a decade ago,” Lachman said. Regulating content by filtering certain keywordsFor example, according to Lachman, it is not very advanced.

And while the new rules will apply to any user who enters a birthday that identifies them as under 18, Lachman says it won’t be difficult for kids to find a way around the controls.

While users can simply put over the age of 18 when creating an account to avoid the rules, Meta says they will use age prediction technology to catch teens using adult accounts.

uses meta AI technology This is partly done by analyzing the date of creation of an account and how an account interacts with content on the platform, before placing content restrictions on accounts it suspects are hidden teens. Meta also says that if teens attempt to change their date of birth from under 18 to over 18 they need to verify their identity with a “video selfie or ID check.”

But technology analyst Carmi Levy says it’s still fairly opaque about how Meta is estimating a user’s age, and how it checks for age-inappropriate content.

“We have not seen the full data from Meta that would give us a better picture of how these tools are working or whether they are working at all,” Levy said. “So we have to listen to them.”

Research has shown that teen account settings for the past year have not always been successful in filtering out unsafe posts, including eating disorder contenta recent Study The Heat Initiative, which advocates for the safety of children online, found that nearly half of teen Instagram users have been exposed to unsafe content (including hate speech or alcohol/drug use content) or unwanted content.The sages in the last month.

Asked about such research, a spokesperson for Meta told CBC News they acknowledge that no system is perfect. He said parents will also be able to provide feedback to the company about what type of content should be limited to teens so that its moderation can be improved.

Parents still need to be cautious

Levy says the new restrictions themselves will help a little, but he worries such announcements could lull parents into a false sense of security.

“Parents assume that platforms like Meta have this problem, that they are taking care of it, and then they ease up on their efforts to make sure their kids are safe in digital environments,” Levy said.

“It’s still family at the end of the dayIt’s your responsibility – mom, dad, caregivers, baby and the community around them – to make sureI am sure that their children are brought up as good digital citizens.”

As the mother of two teenagers – a 14-year-old and a 17-year-old – Katherine Korakakis says the change is welcome. “Anything we can do to equip parents with the tools to … have a safe experience online for their kids, I think is (a) good step,” Korakakis said.

But while their children use Instagram teen accounts, Korakakis isn’t relying on the platform’s guardrails. She says she personally monitors their social media use and retains parental controls that can limit which sites her children can access on their devices and set time limits for individual platforms.

Korakakis says she believes the only real solution is to empower parents with the information to control their children’s social media use.

Levy also says it’s important for parents to talk with their kids about the dangers of social media, because banning kids from technology will only force them to find a way to get around the rules.

“Have conversations so they know they can come to you in a trusting environment, without judgment,” Levy said. “This is a partnership-based approach, not an adversarial approach.”