Instagram for Kids?
This article doesn’t give you a one-word answer regarding if your children are ready for Instagram, but gives you enough clarity to decide it on your own.
Instagram — a photo-sharing application that provides features like newsfeed, stories, messages, video calls, dark mode, tagging, hashtags, live, and IGTV-has declared that the minimum age for someone to have their account is 13. While there have been reports of people using the app for sharing users’ photos without consent, commenting on posts with inappropriate words, sending vulgar messages, and posting explicit content, the company is trying their best to avoid these problems on their platform. Recent updates of the popular social media app also include shopping, message expands with threads, push notifications, new story stickers, more filters to edit photos before uploading, and others. The multibillion-dollar company is also making profits with its apps like Instagram Lite, IGTV, Layout, Threads, and Boomerang.
The company has declared that the minimum age should be 13 for any user to get their account but takes no measures to verify it. Kids just need an email to get an Instagram account. Most of the kids lie about their age for their social media account. A 12-year-old can be 30 on Facebook. While there are no steps taken to verify their age, there’s no exact proof that kids below 13 aren’t on Instagram. This is a massive menace to the kids, and also a new worry to the parents of the digital generation.
When the users create their account, it comes in “public” visibility which means that anyone can look at what they’re posting on feed/stories and can comment/reply to them. Though people can change it to “private,” most of them don’t know about it for the first time because the setting to change it isn’t openly visible. So, does it help your child’s safety if they have a private account? It helps in protecting their identity, but not always. Sometimes their friends with a public account can even post a group photo, tagging your child in it. Though it is recommended for kids to have a private account, it doesn’t change the results when they search for a particular account or a hashtag. Sometimes, their friends also are sharing some inappropriate content with them and it doesn’t matter if they have a private account when they allow everyone to follow them.
Most kids have not yet developed time management skills. As a result, children are often online during late nights, which disrupts their sleep schedule and often their academic performance. A particular screen-time should be followed by them to avoid eye problems. Kids are prone to develop a social anxiety that they’re missing out on the fun by looking at their friends’ pictures hanging out, which is called FOMO. The more time they spend on social media stalking others, the more likely they are to suffer from it.
FOMO (Fear of missing out): Anxiety that an exciting or interesting event may currently be happening elsewhere, often aroused by posts seen on social media.
An article on technology is never complete if you don’t read about fake news and misinformation. In my opinion, fake news is as transmissible as the COVID virus, sometimes even deadlier too. Adults fall into the traps easily, and how can we expect kids to be safe from them? Kids often struggle to discern the reality of these posts. Most of the time when they can’t recognize the false information, even they join hands and help with spreading the false news. Misinformation is not always a simple thing — sometimes it can even lead to disasters.
When kids freely have access to social media, it can increase bullying and harassment. Now that you’ve given them access to it, you’ve made it easier for them to bully/get bullied online. Most children have not yet developed the ability to detect signs of harassment. They don’t think about one’s feelings when they are bullied. But sometimes, bullying can be severe and can even lead to the death of the victim.
Instagram doesn’t block inappropriate content including hashtags, challenges, violence, racism, suicide, drugs, nudity, and others for users below 18. Though it blocks some inappropriate accounts, it doesn’t block EVERYTHING. Most kids are ill-prepared for the content frequently posted on these apps. Some Instagram pages/accounts have nudity in them and even when you report the posts, they won’t be deleted because Instagram says that they’re JUST partially naked which is OK for the 13-year-olds to get access to. Some pages even go far to post animated/cartoon pornographic images, and the best part is that Instagram finds it as a form of “art.” So my question here is, how is Hentai strictly for 18+, while these images are OK for 13+? Reporting these posts 99% never work.
Let’s take a moment to appreciate the fact that Instagram has enabled a mechanism where adults can’t message children below 18 who don’t follow them, but the question here is, how many kids give their real age to their social accounts? Like I said previously, Instagram doesn’t verify the age because all they need is an email to create an account.
These days when many kids compete with each other about the number of followers and likes they have; they’re trying hashtags like #follow4follow #f4f #followforfollow #l4l #likeforlike and #like4like to get more attraction from people around the world. This is nothing but a shoutout to the world asking to follow them to get a follow back. When kids do this, they’re letting strangers have complete access to their profiles. And when the kids follow back the adults, Instagram allows them to send any messages to your children.
When we go to a new place and click a photo to upload it on social accounts, most of us want people to know where the location is. For this reason, Instagram started to provide a feature for its users where they can share their location on their posts. Children when they share their location on their posts, become an easy target for cyberstalkers and predators. The location might be school, a friend’s home, a hangout spot, or even your home — the stalkers know where they are now.
When your child is a target for the predators, they start sending messages including photos. Instagram has made their work much easier by introducing “Disappearing Messages” where anyone can send a photo or a video that automatically disappears within 24 hours. Do we want our children to receive unsolicited photos from strangers? Thanks to the new update on Vanish Mode on Instagram where chats are automatically erased when the chat ends. This looks like Instagram is making an easy way for people out there to scare children and prevent them from using social accounts.
This article is not just about why Instagram isn’t recommended for kids, but also about the steps that it is taking to make it a better place for them. So, let’s not leave behind the fact that it has this policy where unsent messages that are reported are checked and the appropriate action is being taken against those who send inappropriate content.
Social media is also known for triggering anxiety in teens. Teens are curious about what’s happening around the world, but they don’t follow the news; they follow bigwigs, movie stars, personalities on Instagram to check on what’s happening. It gives them anxiety when they miss a post that their friends are talking about. So, most kids are spending several hours on Instagram, scrolling through the feed, hoping to see one message at the end, “You’re all caught up.”
“The fact that I’ve seen all the posts for the day relieves me. I feel so worried when I think about posts that I’m missing on, so I scroll through them until I find ‘You’re all caught up’ at the end.” -Melissa,16.
It’s good for the kids to be social, but social doesn’t mean “online.” Kids are isolating themselves from the real world often living in the “Social World.” I’m not meaning that children shouldn’t have an Instagram account because why should they miss the fun, but I’m saying that the parents should MONITOR them and so should the Instagram take preventive measures to avoid kids fall into the traps of you-know-what. But at the same time, remember that too soon is too much.
Kids can have an Instagram account, but Instagram shouldn’t let kids create their accounts without parental consent. They should take measures to verify the age of the user. The minimum age for the user to create their account should be uplifted to at least 16. More steps to avoid phishing links/scams in the DM section should be taken. As accounts under 18 are restricted from some inappropriate content, they should also be avoided from partial nudity (including paintings/sculptures), violence, racism, suicide, drugs, and other inappropriate content.
Instagram is actively taking measures to make itself a better place for its users. It is providing features to its users where they can hide the number of likes for their posts which is helpful to overcome the fact that many teens are looking out to others and competing with them for the number of likes. It is also allowing users to manage who can comment on their posts, and hiding offensive comments. One of the most important things the users need to know about is they can also choose who can tag them in posts, stories, captions, live videos, etc. This blocks the strangers they don’t follow to not mention them in any unwanted post. They can also custom manage their story preferences for just a selective audience which is one of the best ways to respect one’s privacy if you have a public account.
Instagram might not take care of your children, but you MUST.
How many of you (parents) know that your kid isn’t a bully? Remember that belief can be different from the truth and not everything happens in your knowledge.
