Instagram Offers New Tools for Online Safety

If you see something that shouldn’t be on Instagram such as bullying or offensive content, you can report it to us.Our team works 24/7 to quickly review and remove content that goes against our Community Guidelines.Reporting on Instagram is always anonymous, so the person who posted the content will not know you reported it.To learn how to submit a report visit the Instagram Help Center. As always, we remove content on Instagram when it breaks our rules, not just because it receives multiple reports.Young people face a disproportionate amount of online bullying but are reluctant to report or block peers who bully them, so last year, we created a new feature called Restrict.Once you Restrict an account, you won’t receive any notifications from them. Comments from a restricted account will only be visible to you and the person you restricted, and messages from a limited budget will automatically move to Message Requests.The specified account will not be able to see when you’ve read their direct messages or when you are active on Instagram.In addition to features that help you stand up to bullying, we’ve created new ways to help stop bullying before it happens.If someone writes a comment or caption for a feed post that our AI detects as potentially offensive, they will receive a prompt that the language used is similar to language that has been reported for bullying.They will then have an opportunity to edit the caption or comment before posting.We’ve found that these types of nudges can encourage people to reconsider posting potentially offensive or harmful language.There are some easy things you can do to keep your account safe, including making sure you have a strong password and enabling two-factor authentication.When enabling two-factor authentication, we recommend using an authentication app as your primary security method.To support accounts that have been hacked, we’ve made it easier for you to sign in and reclaim your account.If we detect you are having trouble logging in, or if you select “Need more help” on the login page, we will automatically help you recover your account.First, we will surface options to help you confirm that you own the account, such as entering a code sent to your email or phone.Next, we will help you update your email, phone, and other profile information. After completing this process all other unauthorized accesses to your account will be removed.This lets you recover your account even if the account information has been changed by a hacker.If your account is hacked, we make sure your username is safe for a period of time, so it can’t be claimed by someone else directly after any username changes.Lastly, we know phishing is an increasingly prevalent issue, so to make it easier for people to determine if an email is legitimate, we created Emails from Instagram.Just navigate to Instagram settings, tap “Emails from Instagram” and you will be able to see all recent emails Instagram sent to you.This will help users distinguish legitimate emails sent by Instagram from phishing emails that may appear to come from an official Instagram account.We’re also announcing a new option to appeal to disabled accounts directly within Instagram.Previously, this option was only available through the Instagram Help Center.Now, the in-app appeal option will automatically appear when you attempt to log in to your disabled account.Your username will be pre-populated and you will need to add your full name, e-mail, and a reason why you think we may have made a mistake in disabling your account.Finally, tap “Request a Review” to have your disabled account re-reviewed and potentially restored. This feature will be rolling out over the coming weeks.