Its harder than it seems
Key Takeaways
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Instagram ismaking kids accounts safer.
So why dont all social media networks do the same?
Instagrams new rules make the accounts of kids under 18 private by default and restrict advertising to those accounts.
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This seems like the kind of basic protection for children that should be part of all social networks.
But as with everything on the internet, its never quite that simple.
Valuable and Vulnerable
Kids are valuable to social networks.
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Cyberbullying is one example, as is predatory or weird attention from adults.
“Cyberbullying has been on the rise, and teenagers have been targeted all along.”
The problem is trying to determine the age of minors.
So, how can social networks determine the age of a user?
One way is to force them to show ID, either via a video call or upload.
Instead, the company has developed automated tools to determine the age of a user.
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Facebooks method usesyou guessed itAI.
The system is trained to spot things like people wishing you a happy 15th birthday or happy quinceanera.
It also compares your age claims across different Facebook-owned apps to check the truth of your claims.
Protecting minors is the easy part.
The hard part is finding them.
And that might not play well in lots of places around the world.
