Instagram adds parental supervision features

Meta Platforms Inc (FB.O), the company that owns Facebook, said on Wednesday that it will let parents track how much time their kids spend on Instagram and will soon add parental supervision features to its VR headsets.

Following a whistleblower’s leak of internal documents showing that the company knew Instagram caused body image issues for some teenage girls, Meta is now introducing new parental controls to protect children using its social media apps.

The uproar resulting from the leaked documents led to Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, testifying before Congress in December, where he was grilled about children’s safety online.

The Instagram supervision tools will be available in the United States beginning Wednesday and will roll out globally over the coming months, Meta said.

Parents will be able to view what accounts their children follow and can set time limits for how long their kids spend on the app.

In May, Meta will launch a dashboard that includes supervision tools for its Quest headsets and will automatically block teens from downloading age-inappropriate apps on Quest.

Parental supervision on both Instagram and Quest will require consent from teens, Meta said in a blog post.

The company added its plans to eventually allow parents to oversee their kids’ activities across all of Meta’s services from one central place.