Instagram has announced it will begin restricting the content teenagers can see on its platform, modeling its new approach on the PG-13 rating system used by the film industry.
The Meta-owned platform detailed the changes in a blog post on Tuesday, framing them as a major step in its ongoing mission to create a safer online environment for its younger users.
The policy, expected to be fully implemented by the end of the year, will use the PG-13 film standard as a benchmark.
The standard typically allows for some mild profanity, limited violence, and suggestive content, but with clear limits.
Meta stated that it “would not recommend content containing nudity to teenage users”.
The new rules will also govern the platform’s artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots. These AI features are currently under scrutiny by lawmakers following allegations that they have engaged in inappropriate conversations with minors.
Under the new policy, Meta’s AI characters, which are designed with fictional personalities, will be restricted from providing responses that would be deemed unsuitable for a PG-13 audience.
The update marks Instagram’s most significant change to teen content moderation since last year’s safety overhaul.
In 2024, the platform launched ‘teen accounts,’ a special feature to help protect under-18 users and enhance their safety on the platform
The previous updates also limited what teenagers could see on their feeds. The latest policy goes a step further by making it more difficult for teens to search for adult content or interact with certain accounts.
Instagram will additionally introduce a “limited content” setting, which parents can activate to impose even stricter controls beyond the PG-13 framework.
To develop the new standard, Meta said it consulted panels of thousands of parents, asking them to rate different types of Instagram content based on what they considered PG-13 appropriate.
The company also plans to use its latest AI systems to automatically rate and moderate posts in line with those findings.
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