Key Points
Instagram said its deploying new tools to protect young people and combat sexual extortion, including a feature that will automatically blur nudity in direct messages...
The social media platform said in a blog post Thursday that its testing out the features as part of its campaign to fight sexual scams and other forms of image abuse, and to make it tougher for criminals to contact teens...
Recent high-profile cases include two Nigerian brothers who pleaded guilty to sexually extorting teen boys and young men in Michigan, including one who took his own life, and a Virginia sheriffs deputy who sexually extorted and kidnapped a 15-year-old girl.. Instagram and other social media companies have faced growing criticism for not doing enough to protect young people..
To counter this, it will soon start testing out a nudity protection feature for direct messages that blurs any images with nudity and encourages people to think twice before sending nude images...
The feature is designed not only to protect people from seeing unwanted nudity in their DMs, but also to protect them from scammers who may send nude images to trick people into sending their own images in return, Instagram said...
