After years of being called out by parents, lawmakers, and concerned individuals due to its lack of safety features for youth, Meta announced on March 16 the rollout of parental supervision tools found within the new Family Center of Instagram. According to Instagram, the tools are now available in the US, with plans to make them accessible globally in the coming months.
“Today, we’re making these supervision tools available in our new Family Center,” writes Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, in a Meta blog post. “We worked closely with experts, parents, guardians and teens to develop Family Center, a new place for parents to oversee their teens’ accounts within Meta technologies, set up and use supervision tools, and access resources on how to communicate with their teens about internet use. This is just one step on a longer path — our vision for Family Center is to eventually allow parents and guardians to help their teens manage experiences across Meta technologies, all from one central place.”
Mosseri said that the tools rolled out on Instagram are just the first set of supervisions features for parents and guardians. For the time being, Mosseri said that the initiative of the supervision in the app on mobile devices is on the teen’s end. This means teens will have to approve parental control if their parent or guardian requests it. Nonetheless, the head of Instagram promises to add the option for parents to initiate supervision in the app and on the desktop in June.
On the other hand, once approved, the collection of parental supervision tools will allow parents to observe the activities of young users on the platform. It includes viewing the total time the teen user has spent on Instagram and setting up time limits, receiving notifications when the teen shares they’ve reported someone, and viewing and receiving updates on what accounts the teens follow and the accounts that follow them.
“Over the next few months we’ll add additional features, including letting parents set the hours during which their teen can use Instagram and the ability for more than one parent to supervise a teen’s account,” Mosseri adds.
The new features are joined with the education hub in the Family Center, as Meta hopes to educate parents and guardians on how to properly guide their children in understanding the world of social media. In this section, the adults can access resources from experts and review helpful articles, videos, and tips about the matter. Meta also includes video tutorials explaining the use and how to use the new supervision tools available on Instagram.
“We worked closely with groups like Connect Safely and Net Family News to develop these resources, and we’ll continue to add new information to Family Center’s education hub,” Mosseri said.
