In an effort to combat harassment, Instagram announced on Thursday an expansion of its “Limits” tool specifically designed for teenagers.
This tool allows teens to restrict unwanted interactions with people on the platform. When activated, teens will only see comments, messages, story replies, tags, and mentions from their “Close Friends” group, with interactions from other accounts being muted.
Initially launched as a test in 2021, the Limits feature was developed in response to the online harassment faced by English footballers Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford, and Jadon Sancho after the English team’s loss to Italy in the Euro 2020 finals.
Currently, the Limits feature allows all users to restrict interactions with people they follow and their long-standing followers.
Now fine-tuned for teens, the feature defaults to the “Close Friends” setting to help protect young users from bullying and harassment. While accounts outside of a teen’s “Close Friends” group can still interact with them, their activity will not appear in the teen’s feed.
Additionally, teens can choose to limit interactions with recent followers, defined as accounts that started following them in the past week, or accounts they do not follow back.
Instagram is also enhancing its “Restrict” feature, which allows users to limit interactions from specific accounts without blocking them. Comments from restricted accounts will be hidden, and these accounts will be unable to tag or mention the user.
Earlier this year, Meta, Instagram’s parent company, introduced new restrictions preventing anyone over 18 from messaging teenagers who do not follow them. In April, Meta rolled out a feature to blur nudity in Instagram DMs for teens.
This expansion of protective features is a proactive move by Meta, which has been under scrutiny for teen safety in multiple regions. In October, over 40 U.S. states sued Meta, alleging its product design negatively impacts kids’ mental health.
Recently, the European Union opened an investigation into Facebook and Instagram over their addictive design and potential harm to minors’ mental health.
