Like any other social media platform, Instagram has had trouble dealing with cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is real, whether on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or whichever social media platform you use.
Instagram has hinted; they will be launching two new tools that aim to combat cyberbullying on the platform. The new tools revolve around the offended party and then on Instagram as a platform.
Giving the users control over their experiences on the platform is a better way of addressing bullies on platforms such as Instagram. The Facebook-owned company has been accused of not doing enough to address this problem.
AI-powered Rethink tool
The new tool fully controlled by AI will be able to offer users a chance to retract their hateful comments before they are posted on someone’s post. Are you sure you want to post this?” will be the first line of defense against toxic users. But if the user goes ahead and approves the comment, the target will then have to “shadowban” the offender, a new feature to complement Instagram’s AI tool.
Power to Shadow Ban
The ability to shadowban a user will enable the offended party to block offenders without them ever knowing. The new feature is named Restrict. Instagram VP states the Restrict feature is to empower offended users who rather fear to block an offending party with fears of attracting significant repercussions. But under Restrict, a blocked user will continue to see posts as usual. It is more of a diplomatic way of blocking someone.
Furthermore, targets will have the control to review comments from the offender and they can choose to either approve, delete the comments, or leave them pending. Plus the restricted users can still send a message to the target who won’t view the message unless he/she un-restricts the offender.