Instagram moves to tighten teen account features
Young people using Instagram will soon be restricted from viewing content with PG-13 movie ratings, as Australia prepares for the world’s first social media ban.
As of December 10, people under the age of 16 across Australia will no longer have access to social media accounts and the minimum age will be raised from 13.
While governments around the world closely watched Australia’s implementation of the ban, some social media platforms pushed back.
Ahead of the upcoming deadline, Instagram announced changes to its Teen Accounts feature.
The feature launched in September 2024 and is designed for people ages 13-17, with extra security settings.
Tara Hopkins, director of global public policy at Meta, Instagram’s parent company, announced more age restrictions on Wednesday.
The changes follow consultations with thousands of parents concerned about age-appropriate content.
Ms. Hopkins said teen-oriented content on Instagram will be driven by what a child would see in a PG-13 movie.
“Teens under 18 will automatically be placed in the updated 13+ setting and will not be able to opt out of this setting without parental permission,” he said.
Parents will have extra control over what their kids can view with stricter settings.
Ms Hopkins denied the changes were a last-ditch effort to get around Australia’s social media ban on under-16s.
“This will be a global rollout,” he said.
“We didn’t do that specifically to Australia and what Australia has been through with the social media ban.”
Under the changes, teens will no longer be able to follow accounts that the platform finds regularly share age-inappropriate content or whose names or biographies suggest the account is inappropriate for teens.
This could include creators on OnlyFans, an online subscription service where payment is exchanged for content and nudity is allowed, Ms. Hopkins said.
If teens already follow these accounts, they can no longer view, interact with, or send direct messages to their content.
Instagram also expanded the scope of adult search terms blocked on teen accounts, including alcohol and blood.
The platform’s move comes ahead of Friday’s meeting of education ministers, who will focus on a new national standard against bullying and actions to support the federal government’s rollout of world-leading social media laws.
“Bullying is a serious problem and it is getting worse,” Education Minister Jason Clare said.
“Complaints to the E-Safety Commissioner about online bullying have increased by 450 per cent in the last five years.”
