Today is Safer Internet Day, a day dedicated to helping people understand how to stay safe online. At Instagram, we want to share some of the work we’ve been doing to help people keep themselves and their accounts safer on the platform. Below you’ll learn more about:
- Top tips on keeping your account safe
- How to keep your account secure using Security Checkup
- How to help keep bullying or offensive content off of the platform
- New tools we’re testing to give you more control over your activity, and how friends can help when you have trouble accessing your account
Keeping your account secure
Last summer, we introduced Security Checkup for people whose accounts may have been hacked. Now, this feature is available to everyone worldwide. Security Checkup guides people through the steps needed to secure their account including: checking login activity, reviewing profile information, confirming the accounts that share login information and updating account recovery contact information such as a phone number or email address. To complete Security Checkup, go to your Profile and tap the menu in the upper right corner, next tap “Settings”, “Security” then tap “Security Checkup.”
To help keep your account secure, ensure you have a strong password and enable two-factor authentication. In certain countries, people now have the option to enable two-factor authentication using WhatsApp. Alternatively, you can enable two-factor authentication using your phone number, or an authenticator app like Duo Mobile or Google Authentication. If you are using an authenticator app, it is now possible for Instagram accounts that are being managed by multiple people to enable two-factor authentication across multiple devices. You can learn more about how to do this in the Instagram Help Center.
Managing your Instagram activity
At the end of last year, we started testing a new experience for people to see and manage their activity on Instagram in one place. Now this new experience, called “Your activity,” will start rolling out to everyone.
People will now be able to bulk manage (delete, archive) their content (posts, stories, videos and Reels) and their interactions (comments, likes, story sticker reactions, etc.) In addition, people will be able to sort and filter their content and interactions by date and search for past comments, likes and stories replies from specific date ranges, all in one place. You can also use this to find content that you’ve recently deleted or archived, check out your search history, see the links you’ve visited and the amount of time you’ve spent on the platform and download your information.
To access “Your activity” go to your Profile and tap the menu in the upper right corner, next tap “Your activity”.
Leaning on your friend’s help to access your account
To help people who have lost access to their accounts, we’re testing a way for people to ask their friends to confirm their identity and regain access to their account. We will have more to share about this feature soon.
Finding more information about what’s happening with your content and your reports
When you post something that goes against our Community Guidelines it will appear in your Account Status. To access Account Status go to your Profile and tap the menu in the upper right corner, next tap “Settings” then tap “Account” then tap “Account Status.” Here you will be able to see if any of your posts have been removed, and whether your account is at risk of being disabled. If you think we’ve made a mistake, you can appeal by hitting “Request a Review” directly from your Account Status.
If you see something that shouldn’t be on Instagram such as bullying or offensive content, you can report it to us. Our teams and systems work 24/7 to quickly review and take action on any content we determine goes against our Community Guidelines. Reporting on Instagram is anonymous (unless related to intellectual property violations), and the person who posted the content will not know you reported it. To learn how to submit a report visit the Instagram Help Center. As always, we only remove content on Instagram when it breaks our rules, not just because it receives multiple reports.
When you report something, the report will appear in Support Requests. This feature shows the status of your submitted reports, as well as your report history. To visit Support Requests, go to your Profile and tap the menu in the upper right corner, next tap “Settings” then tap “Support Requests.” From there you can tap any report to see more information about its status. You can also tap “More Options” for suggested actions to take, like muting, blocking, restricting or unfollowing the user whose content you’ve reported. If you disagree with the action we’ve taken on the content you reported, you can tap “Request a Review” to have us take a second look.
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