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Meta, the social media platform’s parent company, unveiled its “Teen Accounts” feature on Tuesday, Sept. 17, automatically placing anyone under the age of 18 into a default private account.
Teens with a private account must accept new followers and people who don’t follow them can’t see their contact or interact with them. It also comes with strict messaging settings, making it so they can only receive messages from people they follow or are already connected to.
Teens will also be placed into the most restrictive setting on Instagram’s sensitive content control, barring things like fighting and cosmetic procedures, the company said.
Additional security features include making it so teens can only be tagged or mentioned by people they already follow, and notifications to leave the app after 60 minutes each day.
Teen accounts also come with a “sleep mode,” which automatically mute notifications between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m.
Users under 16 will need a parent's permission to change any of the built-in protections.
“Today, we’re introducing Instagram Teen Accounts, a new experience for teens, guided by parents. This new experience is designed to better support parents, and give them peace of mind that their teens are safe with the right protections in place," Meta said in a statement.
“The new Teen Account protections are designed to address parents’ biggest concerns, including who their teens are talking to online, the content they’re seeing and whether their time is being well spent.”
Meta said the changes were expected to be implemented within 60 days in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia. The company plans to roll out teen accounts to its other platforms – including Facebook, Threads, and WhatsApp – in 2025.
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