Instagram has announced new, stricter policies to address the problem of cyberbullying and abuse on their platform, along with the launch of a new anti-bullying filter.
The platform has grown in popularity in recent years and is mainly used to share photos. Originally, it was a place for aspiring photographers to build a portfolio, sharing and exchanging comments with others, but with a user base of over 800 million active monthly users, it is now a diverse community of personal and professional bloggers and influencers.
Although Instagram has always promoted community guidelines that discourage bullying and try to encourage kindness, it hasn't always been effective.
Protecting our youngest community members is crucial to helping them feel comfortable to express who they are and what they care about.
Kevin Systrom, CEO, Instagram
The changes will affect accounts that post abusive comments or make threats to people's personal safety.
The platform has also launched a filtering system that will filter out abusive comments or posts containing offensive content without needing to be flagged by a user. If a user continuously breaches the new Instagram guidelines, their account will be reviewed and possibly banned from the platform altogether.
To be clear, we don't tolerate bullying on Instagram. Our Community Guidelines have always prohibited bullying on our platform, and I'm proud to announce this next step in our ongoing commitment to keeping Instagram an inclusive, supportive place for all voices.
Kevin Systrom, CEO, Instagram
The new feature was introduced on May 1st and is optional, making it possible for individual users to disable the filter in their app settings.