How to Enable Parental Control on Instagram | Tech Reddy

As a parent or guardian, you can invite your teen to check in on Instagram.

Young people in this generation are smart and tech savvy, but still young. Instagram knows this, which is why it has released its Review feature to help parents and guardians keep an eye on their teen’s accounts.

Continue reading to learn more about this feature and how you can monitor certain aspects of your child’s Instagram activity.

What is Search on Instagram?

View is a parental control feature introduced by Instagram in October 2022. Parents and guardians can monitor their children’s activities on the app.

Over the years Instagram has come under fire for failing to protect children on the app. Children’s advocates and legal activists in the US have strongly criticized the social network Meta for its plans to launch an Instagram version for children.

Facebook spokesperson Frances Haugen confirmed those concerns when she revealed that Meta is harmful to children who use it. Instagram has halted its plans to launch an Instagram app for kids, instead, it will focus on ways to make the app safer for kids. Monitoring is one of the ways that the popular social media platform hopes to achieve this.

Inspection Operation

We already know that you can use Instagram parental controls to keep your child safe. But there is one form of parental control that allows you to monitor your child’s Instagram account—at least. The browser is built into the Instagram app, unlike other browser apps. Parents and guardians can supervise teenagers 13 to 17. However, it has its own restrictions.

Screening is not mandatory—parents, guardians, and youth choose to use it. Parents and guardians cannot check on young people without their consent. Instagram also doesn’t send them by default because the number is listed when signing up.

Instead, young people are asked to be watched by their parents or guardians, but they can opt out if they don’t want to. Instagram’s Explore feature doesn’t show everything a teen does to their parents, but it does let them know when:

• A teenager posts a report on Instagram, such as reporting abuse.
• When someone follows their profile or follows a new story.

The app allows parents and guardians to monitor how much time their teens spend on Instagram.

How to Enable Browsing on Instagram

It’s easy to activate Search on Instagram. Just remember that the user you want to check must be between the ages of 13 and 17. Here’s how to get started:

1. Open the Instagram app on your phone.
2. Click your Profile icon in the lower-right corner of the screen.
3. Now type the triple dot Menu icon in the upper-right corner of the screen.
4. Tap Identificationand type Check it out.
5. Choose Add accountfollowed by the Create an Invitation button.
6. Instagram creates a referral link. Find your child’s contact from the previewed nearby contacts or tap the base you want to send them a link to. You can swipe up and tap Duplicateand paste the link to the relevant discussion.
7. Send the invitation.

You are all set. Your teenager now has to accept the invitation by clicking on the link, if you want to check their activity on Instagram. But, they can also choose to ignore it and nothing will change.

That’s because both parties have to be willing to participate in Browse on Instagram. This allows the teenager to keep some space while relying on their parents.

Help keep your child safe on Instagram

While Instagram’s Browse feature is a step in the right direction, there’s still a long way to go to keep kids safe on the app.

As a parent, you can use Explore as a tool to monitor some of their Instagram account activity.