This week Instagram has started rolling out a new set of features designed to limit harassment in both comments and private direct messages.
Let’s start with the aptly named Limits.
At the slide of a button users will be able to automatically hide comments and DMs from people who don’t follow you or only recently followed you.
“We developed this feature because we heard that creators and public figures sometimes experience sudden spikes of comments and DM requests from people they don’t know. In many cases this is an outpouring of support — like if they go viral after winning an Olympic medal. But sometimes it can also mean an influx of unwanted comments or messages. Now, if you’re going through that — or think you may be about to — you can turn on Limits and avoid it,” wrote head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri.
The Instagram head also said that the platform it is exploring ways to detect when users are experiencing an influx of comments and DMs so that it can prompt them to turn on Limits.
Limits is being rolled out globally to all users so be sure to check your app’s Privacy settings for that feature.
The next features Instagram is introducing are more of an upgrade for existing features on the platform.
Instagram already warns users if they are about to post a potentially offensive comment and if they try to do this multiple times they are shown increasingly stronger warnings. Now Instagram will show users the strongest warning the first time they post something that is potentially offensive.
“…In the last week we showed warnings about a million times per day on average to people when they were making comments that were potentially offensive. Of these about 50% of the times the comment was edited or deleted by the user based on these warnings,” Mosseri explained.
The second upgrade is to Instagram’s Hidden Words feature which allows users to automatically filter offensive words, phrases and emojis into a Hidden Folder.
“We’ve expanded the list of potentially offensive words, hashtags and emojis that we automatically filter out of comments, and will continue updating it frequently. We recently added a new opt-in option to ‘Hide More Comments’ that may be potentially harmful, even if they may not break our rules,” wrote Mosseri.
While Hidden Words was only available in select countries, it is now being rolled out globally.
Instagram recognises that the fight against harassment and abuse online is ongoing and said that it will continue to invest in tools that tackle these problems.
[Source – Instagram]
