Online sexual harassment is a real scourge. To remedy this, Instagram is testing a new function, called Nudity Protection, capable of detecting and blocking unsolicited nudity photos sent by private message.
The expansion of the Internet has led to the emergence of a new trend that we could have done without: cyberflashing. It involves sending a photo of one’s genitals – by message or in a Bluetooth share – to people who have absolutely not asked for anything. This phenomenon mainly affects women, who receive dick picks – unwanted penis photos – in their private messaging. It is nothing more and nothing less than a form of digital exhibitionism – which is also condemned in certain states such as the United Kingdom – which can go as far as sexual harassment. A YouGov study highlights that 78% of women aged 18 to 34 and 69% of women aged 35 to 54 have already received a dick pick without having asked for it – while only 17% of men admit to having already sent it. Social networks are very affected by this phenomenon and have difficulty protecting their users. According to the study of a British NGO, 90% of images of this type are currently not detected by Instagram’s tools. And that’s without counting the nudes !
Younger users are also particularly vulnerable to sextortion, a practice that involves blackmailing someone with sexual photos. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), an American non-profit organization, warns in a published report in May 2023 on blackmail of sexual photos and videos sent to adolescents, which is on the rise. It reveals an 82% increase in reports of attempts to seduce children online with the aim of blackmailing them – they gain the trust of their future victims, usually by posing as minors themselves or by sending intimate photos. Also, Instagram is trying to remedy these problems thanks to a new tool, Nudity Protection, which it is preparing to test, as it announces in a blog post. It aims in particular to protect adolescents and prevent potential scammers from reaching them, but is also very effective against cyberflashing. The feature will be enabled by default in direct messages (DM) for users under 18 and Meta will notify adults to encourage them to enable it.
Nudity Protection: a new tool to fight online sexual harassment
Under development since September 2022, this tool automatically blocks sexual images before they are seen. More precisely, artificial intelligence (AI) analyzes each photo sent through private messaging – but without having access to it. If she determines that it is a photo containing nudity – initially, it was only the sexual organs – she blurs it before sending it to the recipient. Who can then decide whether to defloat it or not. A way to accept nudes – which are therefore consented – but not cyberflashing. “As images are analyzed on the device itself, nudity protection will also work in end-to-end encrypted chats, where Meta will not have access to these images – unless someone chooses to report them to us”, explains the company. Note that, unlike Messenger and WhatsApp, direct messages on Instagram are not encrypted, but the company has said it plans to deploy encryption for this service.
Nudity Protection integrates into the “Hidden Words” function introduced in 2021. It allows you to automatically filter requests for private messages containing offensive content. Liz Fernandez, a spokesperson for Meta, told The Verge : “We are working closely with experts to ensure these new options preserve users’ privacy, while giving them full control over the messages they receive”. Meta also said it is developing technology to identify accounts that may be involved in sextortion scams and is testing new pop-up messages for users who may have interacted with such accounts. .
Under increasing pressure from the United States and Europe, Meta is working to make its social network more secure. Last July, the company made it more difficult for people you don’t follow to overwhelm users with unwanted DMs (direct messages) (see our article). In January 2024, it also took steps to better protect minors on its services, preventing those under 16 from receiving messages from strangers on Instagram and Messenger (see our article). She added that it would be harder for teenagers to find sensitive content such as suicide, self-harm and eating disorders.