Instagram to Notify Parents About Teen Search Activity aims to improve teen online safety and parental supervision on Instagram. The platform will alert parents if their teenager repeatedly searches for terms related to suicide or self-harm. These alerts build on Instagram’s supervision settings and help block harmful content on social media.
The new feature applies to teen accounts under parental permission in the United States, Britain, Australia, and Canada. Parents can opt into an optional supervision layer, allowing search monitoring for teens while respecting privacy concerns. Instagram redirects users searching for unsafe content to support resources, further enhancing suicide prevention on Instagram and self-harm content alerts.
Governments worldwide are increasingly focusing on protecting children online. Australia implemented a social media ban for users under 16 in December 2025. Britain, Spain, Greece, and Slovenia are considering similar child protection measures. These regulations complement Instagram’s content moderation policies and parental control settings, ensuring teens have access to safe online experiences.
Instagram emphasizes that these alerts only notify parents of repeated searches, rather than daily activity, maintaining a balance between supervision and teen privacy. AI content monitoring tools, like chatbot Grok, also help identify harmful content quickly. Experts say this combination of teen account monitoring, alerts for risky searches, and support resource redirection strengthens teen online protection and digital well-being.
This initiative demonstrates Instagram’s commitment to teen safety while addressing growing global concerns about harmful content on social media. Parents now have better tools to monitor online activity, protect children on social media, and intervene when risky behavior is detected.
