To mark Safer Internet Day, we are reinforcing our commitment to online safety of young users with the expansion of Instagram Teen Accounts to India in a phased manner. Teen accounts are designed to create a more secure and age-appropriate space for teens online. With built-in protections, Teen Accounts limit unwanted interactions, enhance privacy settings, and provide parents with greater oversight, ensuring a safer social media experience for our young users.

In an era where digital interactions shape young minds, ensuring their safety online has never been more critical. Parents, educators, and policymakers alike have voiced concerns over issues like cyberbullying, exposure to harmful content, and privacy risks. Instagram’s new Teen Accounts address these concerns by automatically placing all teens in the highest safety settings, empowering them with better tools to navigate the digital world securely.

“At Meta, creating a safer and more responsible digital environment is a top priority. With the expansion of Instagram Teen Accounts to India, we are strengthening protections, enhancing content controls, and empowering parents, while ensuring a safer experience for teens.” – Natasha Jog, Director, Public Policy India, Instagram

Built-in Protections for Teens

The Teen Account protections are specifically designed to tackle key concerns parents have, such as who their teens interact with online, the type of content they are exposed to, and how they manage their time on the platform. These safeguards are enabled by default, and for users under 16, any adjustments to make settings less restrictive would require parental approval.

• Private Accounts: By default, teen accounts are set to private, meaning they must approve new followers, and non-followers cannot view or interact with their content. This applies to all users under 16 (both existing and new) and those under 18 when signing up.
• Messaging Restrictions: Teens will have the strictest messaging settings enabled, allowing them to receive messages only from people they follow or are already connected with.
• Sensitive Content Control: Teens will automatically be placed in the most restrictive setting, limiting their exposure to sensitive content, such as depictions of physical fights or promotions of cosmetic procedures, in areas like Explore and Reels.
• Limited Interactions: Teens can only be tagged or mentioned by people they follow. Additionally, the strictest version of the anti-bullying feature, Hidden Words, will be enabled by default to filter out offensive language in comments and DM requests.
• Time Limit Reminders: Teens will receive notifications prompting them to exit the app after 60 minutes of daily usage.
• Sleep Mode: Sleep mode will be enabled from 10 PM to 7 AM, muting notifications and automatically sending replies to DMs overnight.

For parents, Teen Accounts provide supervision tools that allow them to monitor and manage their teen’s experience, including approving changes to safety settings and setting daily screen-time limits.

“Teen safety online is a growing concern for parents, and Instagram’s new Teen Accounts feature is a step in the right direction. Strengthening privacy settings, limiting unwanted interactions, and adding parental supervision tools can help create a safer space for young users. At Kidsstoppress, we’re committed to helping parents stay informed and start meaningful conversations with their teens about responsible social media use,” – Mansi Zaveri, Founder & CEO of Kidsstoppress.com

Expanded Supervision Tools for Parents

For teens under 16, any changes to make settings less restrictive will require parental approval. Parents can also enable supervision for older teens (16+) at any time, allowing them to review and approve changes to their teen’s safety settings. Soon, parents will have the ability to directly adjust these settings to provide even stronger protections.

While Teen Accounts come with automatic safeguards, parents who want additional control can now access new supervision features, including:

• Monitoring recent conversations – Parents can see a list of people their teen has messaged in the past seven days (without reading message content).
• Setting daily time limits – Once the set time limit set by parents is reached, the teen will no longer be able to access Instagram.
• Blocking Instagram during specific hours – Parents can restrict Instagram access at night or during designated times with a simple toggle.

How we are enforcing Teen Accounts and helping ensure Teens See Age-Appropriate Content 

To ensure that teens receive the right protections and do not bypass age restrictions, Instagram is strengthening age verification measures. Since some young users may misrepresent their age, additional verification steps will be required in certain situations—such as when someone attempts to create an account with an adult birthdate. This will help ensure that all teens are placed under the appropriate safety settings.

Alongside age verification, Instagram is also enhancing content protections to ensure teens are exposed to only age-appropriate material. We’ll continue to take action on content that violates Community Guidelines, while sensitive content controls will be set to the strictest level by default. This means that teens will have limited exposure to potentially harmful content, such as sexually suggestive material or discussions around self-harm. In many cases, even if such content is shared by someone they follow, it will be automatically hidden.

“The recent updates to Instagram’s teen accounts introduce an additional layer of security and represent an incremental step toward strengthening online safety on Meta platforms. Balancing teen autonomy and online safety remains a complex challenge, and this initiative is a move in that direction. With effective implementation and oversight, such updates have the potential to drive meaningful improvements in teen safety online.” – Uma Subramanian, Co-Founder & Director, RATI Foundation