New Instagram tools to protect teenagers from sextortion
A function for blurring nude images also announced
by L.Tre.
2' min read
2' min read
The possibility of hiding follower lists, preventing screenshots of certain images in direct messages and the blurring of nude images that makes them blurry.
These are the updates that Instagram deploys to combat 'sextortion', erotic images used as a means of blackmail, a crime in which teenagers are often involved.
Following the test announced in April, Instagram is extending its nude content protection function globally. It will be enabled by default for teenagers under 18. "It will blur out images that we detect as nudity when sent or received in direct messages and warn people about the risks associated with sending sensitive images," Meta points out.
What is sextortion?
It is a crime, whereby malicious people, motivated by financial interests, target teenagers and young adults around the world, threatening to spread their intimate images if they do not get what they want. In essence, Meta will make it more difficult for accounts showing suspicious behaviour to send follow requests to teenagers. Depending on the severity of these signals - for example how recent an account is - they will either block the follow request completely, or send it to the teenager's spam folder.
Sextortion scammers often use the follower and follower lists of their targets to try to blackmail them. Now, accounts detected as suspicious will no longer be able to see these lists, eliminating the possibility of exploiting this functionality. In addition, potential scammers will also not be able to see lists of who has liked a person's posts, the photos in which that person has been tagged, or the other accounts tagged in that photo.
