Facebook: New changes to messaging and privacy settings introduced, here's what to know

Meta have announced changes to Facebook after reports of online child sexual exploitation increased from 12,000 in 2018 to 44,000 last year. The changes to privacy and messaging settings are designed to protect teens from predators after the increase of 265% in reports of online exploitation in recent years, as per the Daily Mail.

The shocking statistics come from a report by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which manages a cyber tip line for the public and internet service providers. It is hoped the new settings will encourage safer use of the social media platform and prevent ‘suspicious’ adults from contacting teens.

Privacy settings

Initial changes will include a change in the default privacy settings on new accounts opened by users aged under 16. The changes will afford the user more protection early on with the visibility of their friends list, tagged posts, and pages and accounts they follow automatically set to ‘more private settings’, as per Engadget.

Meta already prevents adults from sending messages to teens they aren't connected with or from seeing teens in their People You May Know recommendations. However they are also now testing new ways to stop teens contacting ‘suspicious’ adults and removing them from the People You May Know list.

In a blog post by Meta, they explained:

As an extra layer of protection, we’re also testing removing the message button on teens’ Instagram accounts when they’re viewed by suspicious adults altogether.

Suspicious adults

The term 'suspicious adult' is not clearly defined in the post but Meta explained they would take into account factors such as if the account has been recently blocked or reported by a young person.

Meta also went on to describe how they are working on an update to prevent the spread of teens’ intimate images online, specifically when they are shared in an exploitative way - known as ‘sextortion’. The post stated:

The non-consensual sharing of intimate images can be extremely traumatic and we want to do all we can to discourage teens from sharing these images on our apps in the first place.

If anyone needs support or information relating to sextortion they can visit the Stop Sextortion hub on the Facebook Safety Centre. Here you can also find a guide for parents on how totalk to their teens about intimate images.

Sources used:

- Daily Mail 'Meta unveils Facebook privacy and messaging changes to protect teens from being seen or messaged by predators - after online child sexual exploitation reports increased to 44,000 last year from 12,000 in 2018'

- Engadget 'Meta is trying to prevent 'suspicious' adults from messaging teens on Facebook and Instagram'

-Meta'Protecting Teens and Their Privacy on Facebook and Instagram'