Instagram has announced a number of improvements to help users not be disturbed while scrolling through their feed, as well as better control over Explore content and how a parent can browse their teen’s Instagram account.
detailed w blog post (opens in a new tab), these features are slowly rolling out to iOS and Android users starting today (January 19), with the main improvement being silent mode. Similar to Do Not Disturb on iOS and Android, it will let your followers know that you don’t want to be disturbed for a certain amount of time.
This is a handy feature for those who mainly use Instagram above other social platforms, along with the ability to group a few photos and videos in the Explore tab that you’re not interested in – something that does more in my opinion.
However, there is one aspect of Instagram that I would like to improve next.
Now let’s try to fix spam
Recently, when I post a story on my Instagram account, I get a flurry of notifications from spam accounts that have 0 followers with links to adult content websites. Above is a small example of this and it is surprising.
While it’s good to see improved parental controls, anyone using the platform will be vulnerable to spam like me regardless, so this should be a priority for Meta.
The same goes for posting photos on mine as well dog’s Instagram account (opens in a new tab). Suddenly, I get notifications to share a post on another account with two followers, or I get requests to do a “collaboration” for gadgets, leading to empty links and webpages devoted to completely different topics.
Spam seems to be getting worse lately, so let’s take a look at the new efforts to curb this. Every user is at risk of talking to a spam account that could potentially steal their account, and with more focus on parental controls, it seems like the perfect time to look at the problem and find a solution.