“We’ll use this time to work with parents, experts and policymakers to demonstrate the value and need for this product,” says Adam Mosseri
Instagram has announced it is shelving its controversial plans to build a version for young users, which faced vehement criticism from politicians and general public raising concerns about potential online harms to children.
Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, said in a series of tweets and a blog post that the Facebook-owned social media platform was “pausing” ‘Instagram Kids’ and building parental supervision tools.
Mosseri said the project had leaked before concrete plans were ready and meant the company was unable to properly address concerns raised in some quarters, adding that Instagram would now “take more time” to work on it.
“While we stand by the need to develop this experience, we’ve decided to pause this project. This will give us time to work with parents, experts, policymakers and regulators, to listen to their concerns, and to demonstrate the value and importance of this project for younger teens online today,” wrote Mosseri.
“This experience was never meant for kids. We were designing an experience for tweens (10-12yo), and it was never going to be the same as Instagram today. Parents approve tween accounts and have oversight over who they follow, who follows them, who messages them, time spent etc.
“But the project leaked way before we knew what it would be. People feared the worst, and we had few answers at that stage. Recent WSJ (Wall Street Journal) reporting caused even greater concern. It’s clear we need to take more time on this.
“So, we’re pausing. We’re going to take the time to work with parents, policymakers, regulators, experts, to demonstrate why this project is valuable, and how it helps keep teens safe. Critics will see this as a concession that the project is a bad idea. That’s not it.”
Mosseri said that Instagram planned to introduce new parental supervision controls on the app in the coming months.
“Parental supervision was a big part of what we were already building for u13s, and in the coming months we’re going to expand opt-in parental supervision to teen accounts on Instagram, giving parents more oversight of their teen’s experiences on our app,” he said.
“We’ll continue all the work we do to keep teens safe. We’ve spent a lot of time on bullying, social comparison, and age-appropriate features like default private accounts for u18s. But we’re doing more, like building new features like ‘Nudges’ and ‘Take a Break’. More to come.”
