As part of the ongoing efforts to make Instagram less of a cesspool of creepy adults the company announced a slew of new changes for accounts belonging to teens to keep them safer on the platform.

Instagram says it will now switch the default account settings for users under the age of 16 to “private” when they sign up. This means that only approved followers will be able to see what pictures or clips these younger users post—and they don’t need to worry about any messages from older creeps trickling into their DM’s. Instagram has developed yet another algorithm, this time to pick out adult accounts flagged as engaging in “potentially suspicious behavior,” such as adult accounts recently “blocked or reported by a young person.” When those accounts get flagged, Instagram will no longer show teen accounts on that adult’s Explore, Reels, or “Accounts Suggested For You” pages; and if that adult happens to find younger people’s accounts by searching for their usernames, Instagram will block the adult’s ability to follow them, or interact with the younger user at all.  When the teen turns 18 then he/she can have a public account.

Instagram confirmed the company is testing a new feature called “Limits,” which would give users the ability to temporary lock down their accounts when they’re being targeted by a flood of harassment. The announcement of the new feature is a response to the recent racism that took place on Instagram’s platform following the Euro 2020 final, and noted the company was working on improvements to both internal and customer-facing tools to help address this problem.

Twitter is getting with the times and will begin allowing businesses to showcase products for sale at the top of their profile page. Twitter said it will begin testing the new shopping feature with “a handful of brands” in the United States. Users can scroll through a carousel of products at the top of the brand’s profile. The customer can tap on a product, and then pay through the retailer’s website.

BONUS:

Pinterest To enable influencers to leverage the platform to make a living, Pinterest has added a cross-section of pins on its social site to give users the ability to tap on those pins to make purchases. Creators can also make use of affiliate links to bank a percentage of sales volume. Pinterest is also adding a “paid partnerships” label for creators who share branded content. Influencers who create content on behalf of a company can tag the brand in Idea Pins. Once the brand gives the tag the green light, the label will appear. The goal is to improve transparency and make it easier for creators to disclose paid partnerships. It will start to slowly roll out to business accounts in the US, UK, and other countries.