While these steps by the social media platform could improve the safety of children online, some of the updates will only be rolled out in countries like the US, UK, and Australia for now. Instagram on Tuesday announced three changes it is making to improve the safety of young users on its platform: Making accounts of users under the age of 16 private by default Making it harder for suspicious accounts to find young users Limiting advertisers' ability to target young users Both Facebook and Instagram allow users that are at least 13 years old to join their platforms. But Instagram is also reportedly developing a version of its app for children under the age of 13. Why this matters? The safety of children on social media platforms has always been a priority but even more so now because the Covid-19 pandemic has pushed children into spending more time online, whether it be for education, recreation, or social media. The measures announced by Instagram have been long overdue, but are welcome nevertheless. Making accounts of users under the age of 16 private by default "Wherever we can, we want to stop young people from hearing from adults they don’t know, or that they don’t want to hear from. We believe private accounts are the best way to prevent this from happening. So starting this week, everyone who is under 16 years old (or under 18 in certain countries) will be defaulted into a private account when they join Instagram." - Instagram In addition to letting users…
