Back in February, Instagram dropped the ban hammer to protect their users from graphic images that depict self-harm & scars etc. Instagram announced that they wouldn’t be accepting any submissions from their user base that’ll include cutting or encourages suicide or self-harm and they’ll be providing help to those who have been known for posting similar kind of images by directing them to helpful organisations.
Instagram recently expanded this ban to include images that are essentially drawing or memes that depict self-harm. Instagram will not be completely removing every image that’s posted, but they’ll filter out the ones who are found to post similar kind of content on the platform continuously.
Instagram Chief Adam Mosseri recently mentioned the potential dangers of these kinds of posts on their Instagram blog post saying: Nothing is more important to them than the safety of the people who are using their platform. Things like self-harm and suicide are complex things that people around us deeply care about. There are a lot of ways these harmful things can be handled, but as a parent, they matter to them a lot. They were able to remove more than 77% of the content that they found to contribute to the issue before they were even reported to them.
A report in 2017, showed that Instagram had the biggest impact on people when it came to depression or bullying. Mosseri also mentioned that the account that are found to be sharing these sort of images would never be indexed in the search results or in the explore section, which should impact on the people who repeatedly push these boundaries. This decision from Instagram is an extremely beneficial step that should steer away any negative impact users might be getting from Instagram.
