Although this generation’s teenagers are smart and tech-savvy, they are still young people. Instagram is aware of this, therefore it launched the Supervision feature to help parents and guardians in monitoring their children’s accounts. For more information about this feature and how to activate it to monitor specific areas of your child’s Instagram activity, keep reading.
What Is Supervision On Instagram?
Instagram launched Supervision, a parental management function, in October 2022. It allows parents and guardians to keep an eye on what their kids are doing on the app. For not adequately safeguarding children on the service, Instagram has faced criticism over the years. The social media platform owned by Meta has come under heavy criticism in the US from child groups and lawmakers for its plans to introduce a children’s version of Instagram.
Concerns were furthered when Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen disclosed that Meta’s apps hurt children who use them. Since then, Instagram has postponed its plans to release an app specifically for children in favor of concentrating on methods to make the app safer for kids. One method the well-known social media platform plans to use to do that is supervision.
We already know that you can protect your child with Instagram’s parental controls. However, there is another type of parental control that allows you to, at least somewhat, keep an eye on your child’s Instagram account. Unlike other supervision programs, Instagram has built-in supervision. It enables guardians and parents to watch over teenagers between the ages of 13 and 17. It does, however, have some drawbacks.
How Supervision Works
The use of supervision is optional for parents, guardians, and teenagers. Without teens’ permission, parents and guardians cannot supervise teenagers. Additionally, Instagram does not automatically opt them in due to the age they specified while registering.
Teens are instead offered to be supervised by their parents or guardians, but they are allowed to decline if they so want. The Supervision tool on Instagram doesn’t notify parents of all of a teen’s activities, but it does so in the following situations:
- when a teen reports something to, such as harassment.
- when a new profile is followed or when someone follows their profile.
Parents and guardians can keep an eye on how much time their children spend on Instagram by exercising supervision.
How To Keep Instagram Supervision Availability
On Instagram, Supervision is simple to enable. Just keep in mind that the person you want to monitor must be 13 to 17 years old. How to begin going is as follows:
- On your phone, launch the app.
- In the lower right corner of the screen, tap your Profile symbol.
- In the top-right corner of the screen, tap the three dots that represent the menu.
- Select Supervision from the Settings menu.
- Select Add Account, then click Create Invitation.
- An invitation link will be generated by Instagram. Choose your child’s contact from the recently viewed contacts, or choose the platform where you wish to share the link with them.
- You can also swipe up, select Copy, and then paste the link into the proper chat.
Send The Invite
You are ready. If your kid is comfortable with you monitoring their Instagram activities, they must now accept the invitation by touching the link. They can choose to disregard it, though, in which case nothing will alter. This is because Supervision on Instagram requires participation from both parties. In addition to building trust with their parents, this enables the teen to keep some level of privacy.
