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Instagram for kids, or Kidstagram, as they surely won’t call it, is on the way, according to a recent leak. The service will target those under the age of 13 who are currently prohibited from using the service under Facebook’s terms of service. The move is likely aimed at turning these youngsters into “grammers for life” by hooking them early.
Apparently, Facebook has identified the youth market as a priority for Instagram and intends to launch a service for younger users designed with their specific security needs in mind. Apparently the project will be led by new recruit Pavni Diwanji, who is no stranger to this kind of service. Diwanji ran Google’s YouTube Kids service, which made her the ideal person for the role.
Documents viewed by Buzzfeed News detail comments made by Vishal Shah, the VP of Product at Instagram.
Shah posted on the company’s internal message board: “I am pleased to announce that, going forward, we have identified youth work as a priority for Instagram and added it to our H1 priority list. We will build a new youth pillar within the Community Product Group to focus on two things: (a) accelerate our integrity and privacy work to ensure the safest possible experience for teens, and (b) build a version of Instagram that enables people under the 13-year-old to use Instagram safely for the first time. “
The post comes just two days after the company pledged to do more to protect young users who have been harassed or abused on the platform. In a blog post, Instagram accepted that certain improvements were overdue. Young people can, and this will surprise you, simply lie about their age in order to have early access to service, the company admitted.
In addition, there are plans to prevent adults from sending instructions to children who do not follow them. The company also suggests other measures, such as not showing teen content to adults in their news and encouraging teens to make their accounts private. These are all decent ideas, but not exactly totally new concepts.
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