Meta's Instagram has stepped up its efforts to protect teenagers on its platforms, rolling out a new educational campaign to help teenagers and parents identify and protect against sextortion scams. The campaign will be backed by a suite of new safety features to help identify sextortion scams early.

The campaign, developed in collaboration with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) and Thorn, will launch across the US, UK, Canada and Australia next month. It features an informative video that outlines common tactics used by scammers, such as pushing for photo exchanges or moving conversations off-platform.

The move comes as federal legislators work towards a social media age restriction, with the Albanese Government having committed to working with states and territories to establish a national framework. The new legislation has been promised to land in Parliament before the end of the year.

Meta has made a concerted public effort to address teen safety in the face of the federal crackdown, last month launching Instagram Teen Accounts in Australia. These accounts have specific settings and features designed to protect teens, including default private accounts, limited ad targeting, and restrictions on direct messaging and interactions with adults they don't follow.

The teen accounts were introduced a week after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the imminent legislation, but were said to have been "many months in the making", per Meta managing director for Australia, Will Easton.

The features that launch alongside Instagram's new educational campaign are designed to further protect teens and make it more difficult for criminals to succeed. These include preventing screenshots and screen recordings, which can be used by scammers to capture explicit content without consent. In-app safety notices will alert users to potential risks, while nudity protection will help prevent the sharing of explicit content. Protections for follower and following lists will also make it harder for scammers to target users.

Instagram says sextortion scams, where individuals are threatened with the release of explicit images unless they pay money or provide more explicit content, have been a growing concern. By educating users about common scam tactics and providing tools to protect against them, Instagram aims to create a safer online environment for its younger users.

“The dramatic rise in sextortion scams is taking a heavy toll on children and teens, with reports of online enticement increasing by over 300% from 2021 to 2023. Campaigns like this bring much-needed education to help families recognize these threats early. By equipping young people with knowledge and directing them to resources like NCMEC’s CyberTipline, and Take it Down, we can better protect them from falling victim to online exploitation," said Senior Vice President from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, John Shehan.