Instagram is rolling out some changes today to keep the platform a more positive place for users. Two features rolling out now include the ability to control who can tag or mention you in comments, captions, or Stories as well as the ability to delete comments in bulk.
Instagram noted in a blog post today about the updates that the latest changes are part of its efforts to “fight online bullying” and come along with parent company, Facebook’s release of its May Community Standards Enforcement Report.
Today, we’re sharing the fifth edition of our Community Standards Enforcement report which tracks our progress to keep Facebook and Instagram safe. In addition to this report, we’re announcing new features that mark the continuation of our effort to lead the industry in the fight against online bullying.
Delete comments in bulk
First up, after testing the ability to delete comments in bulk to reduce negative interactions and bullying, Instagram is launching the feature to all users. Here’s how it works:
To enable this feature on iOS, tap on a comment and then the dotted icon in the top right corner. Select Manage Comments and choose up to 25 comments to delete at once. Tap More Options to block or restrict accounts in bulk. To block or restrict accounts on Android, press and hold on a comment, tap the dotted icon and select Block or Restrict.
Control who can tag and mention you
Another anti-bullying feature to roll out starting today is the option for users to control who can mention or tag them. Now you’ll see the choice of “Everyone,” “Only People You Follow,” and “No One” to decide what’s right for you.
We’ve seen that tags and mentions can be used to target or bully others, so we’re rolling out new controls that allow you to manage who can tag or mention you on Instagram. You can choose whether you want everyone, only people you follow or no one to be able to tag or mention you in a comment, caption or Story.
Upcoming feature…
Another effort to promote positive experiences on Instagram will see a pinned comments feature arriving first as a test and possible to all users at some point.
Soon, we’ll begin testing Pinned Comments. This feature gives people a way to set the tone for their account and engage with their community by pinning a select number of comments to the top of their comments thread.
Instagram is a free download from the App Store.
You can read more about Facebook and Instagram’s progress to a more positive culture in the May Community Standards Enforcement Report and here’s a snippet from what Instagram saw in Q4 2019 and Q1 2020.
On Instagram, we made improvements to our text and image matching technology to help us find more suicide and self-injury content. As a result, we increased the amount of content we took action on by 40% and increased our proactive detection rate by more than 12 points since the last report. We also made progress in our work combating online bullying by introducing several new features to help people manage their experience and limit unwanted interactions, and we announced new Instagram controlstoday. We are sharing enforcement data for bullying on Instagram for the first time in this report, including taking action on 1.5 million pieces of content in both Q4 2019 and Q1 2020.
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