Meta’s New Privacy Settings For Teens Now Active

Facebook will become a safer platform for young people. Meta’s new privacy settings for teens will protect them from potentially dangerous adults.

The new features will become the default for new users. Meanwhile, the social media app will notify existing teen users to activate these privacy settings.

Facebook is also developing new tools to prevent AI-generated inappropriate images from spreading on the internet. Additionally, it will launch educational campaigns to combat child exploitation.

How do Meta’s new privacy settings work?

Photo Credit: www.kaspersky.com

Beginning November 21, 2022, Facebook users below the legal age in their respective countries will receive a reminder about modifying these settings:

• Who can see their friends list
• The people who can view the people, lists, and pages they follow
• Who can see posts they’re tagged in on their profile
• Reviewing posts that tag them before the post appears on their profiles
• Who may comment on their public posts

Teens will receive a pop-up window that will recommend turning on Meta’s new privacy settings. Meanwhile, new users will have these options set as the default.

If an adult contacts them, the app will ask them if they know the person in real life. Moreover, Facebook will explain how the options work. 

Teenagers may tap on Restrict, Report, and Block to execute the corresponding commands. Also, Facebook assures the young person that the other person will not know their actions. 

Protecting children with AI

Photo Credit: thinkml.ai

Artificial intelligence has been a surprisingly effective tool for protecting children from sexual exploitation.

Aside from Meta’s privacy settings for teens, the social network uses AI to identify explicit content quickly. Also, it reports the content to National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

AI helps find users who may have had inappropriate interactions with kids. Besides Facebook, other groups are developing tech tools that protect children. 

For example, Japanese startup Smartbooks is working with Fujita Health University to create an AI image detection app.

The Kodomamo project deletes nude photos from children’s smartphones by recognizing specific body parts.

Naoto Tomita, the co-founder of Smartbooks, hopes to make the app free for everyone by the end of 2022.

Conclusion

Meta’s new privacy settings for teens will increase internet safety for young people. Yet, the company’s drive for online privacy goes beyond the app.

The Facebook firm works with the online child safety group Thorn and its NoFiltr platform to create educational content. The materials would inform young people about how to keep themselves safe online. 

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