Instagram are due to be releasing their new sword for combating online bullies and it comes in the form of artificially intelligent flagged comments, and the ability for account holders to restrict users from commenting on their posts.
A test of the “shadow ban” service is soon to be trialed, meaning the account holder is able to restrict comments from other users, meaning only they can see comments they make. The “shadow ban” also means the user cannot see when the account holder is on Insta or when direct messages have been read.
The Artificial Intelligence comes in the form of comment creation, so when a user is posting a comment the AI will check for language which is pre-programmed into the AI and if any such language is used the user will be asked whether they really want to post the comment. During testing this approach showed that “some users” reflect on what they wrote when prompted. Obviously “some” isn’t great, but its better than none, and if those people read it back and they feel it was rude or hurtful to the account holder and maybe delete it, then surely that is a good thing.
These tests follow a barrage of abuse received by Instagram for how they have handled cyber bullies up till now, “attacks on a person’s appearance or character, as well as threats to a person’s well-being or health”. At present account holders would have to report the user who has committed the bullying and this would then have to be vetted by Instagram, these new features are immediate.
This comes as Instagram are also looking into removing the number of likes from a account holders pictures. Are they heading in the right direction, let us know your thoughts.
