Instagram to alert parents if teens ask AI chatbot about suicide or self-harm
Meta is rolling out a new safety feature that will see parents alerted if their teenager discusses suicide or self-harm with Instagram's built-in AI chatbot.
By Sky News
Meta is launching a new safety feature on Instagram that will alert parents if their teenager asks the platform’s built-in AI chatbot about suicide or self-harm. The system uses a dedicated AI to identify conversations involving suicide or self-harm, and when such topics are detected, Meta will proactively notify the teen’s supervising parent or guardian .
Before sending an alert, all flagged chats are manually reviewed by human staff to avoid causing panic over ambiguous intent, though the company will err on the side of caution and send notifications even if the teen’s intent is unclear . When an underage user discusses suicide or self-harm, Meta AI already directs them to crisis helplines and encourages them to reach out to a trusted adult .
The new feature also provides parents with resources and advice on how to support their children . The safety update is now live for parents using Instagram’s parental supervision tools in the US, UK, Australia and Canada .
Meta plans to roll out the feature to all users with parental supervision globally by the end of the year .