Facebook is planning to create a version of Instagram for children under 13, according to documents obtained by BuzzFeed News.
“I’m excited to announce that from now on we’ve identified youth work as a priority for Instagram and added it to our H1 priority list,” wrote Vishal Shah, Instagram’s vice president of product, on an employee board, according to BuzzFeed.
“We will be building a new pillar of youth within the Community Product Group to focus on two things: (a) speeding up our integrity and privacy work to ensure the safest experience possible for teenagers and (b) building a version of Instagram that allow people under the age of 13 to use Instagram safely for the first time, “added Shah.
The new project is said to be overseen by Instagram chief Adam Mosseri and led by Vice President Pavni Diwanji. Diwanij previously worked at Google, where he oversaw the creation of children’s products like YouTube Kids.
From Instagram terms of use currently prohibits minors under the age of 13 from using the application.
“We have to do a lot here,” Mosseri told BuzzFeed. “But part of the solution is to create a version of Instagram for young people or children where the parents have transparency or control. It is one of the things we are exploring ”.
Mosseri said the project was under development and added that Instagram does not yet have a “detailed plan” in place.
“More and more children are asking their parents if they can join apps that help them stay in touch with their friends. At the moment, there are not many options for parents, so we are working on building additional products – as we did with Messenger Kids – that are suitable for children, managed by parents, “a Facebook company spokesman told The Hill in a statement, “We are exploring bringing a parent-controlled experience to Instagram to help children keep up with their friends, discover new hobbies and interests and more.”
BuzzFeed notes that Instagram just published a blog post this week addressing bullying among its teenage users.
“We require everyone to be at least 13 years old to use Instagram and we ask new users to provide their age when signing up for an account for some time. While many people are honest about their age, we know that young people can lie about their dates of birth, “wrote Instagram in Tuesday’s blog post. “To address this challenge, we are developing new artificial intelligence and machine learning technology to help us keep teenagers safer and apply new age-appropriate features.”
The new features included restricting direct messages between teenagers and adults they don’t follow, prompting teenagers to be more cautious about direct message interactions, encouraging teenagers to make their accounts private, and making it harder for adults to find and follow teenagers.