Instagram Adds Sensitive Content Controls

Instagram is letting users decide how much or how little sensitive content they prefer to see on the platform. 

The social network introduced the Sensitive Content Control feature on Tuesday to let people decide if they want to see sensitive content in the Explore tab. 

Instagram describes sensitive content as "posts that don’t necessarily break our rules, but could potentially be upsetting to some people—such as posts that may be sexually suggestive or violent."

"You can decide to leave things as they are or you can adjust the Sensitive Content Control to see more or less of some types of sensitive content. We recognize that everybody has different preferences for what they want to see in Explore, and this control will give people more choice over what they see," Facebook wrote in its post announcing the feature. 

If you choose to set the control feature to "allow," you may end up seeing more photos and videos that could be considered upsetting or offensive to you. The default setting is "limit," which shows only some offensive content, and there's also an option to tighten controls even further so you see even less of that stuff on your feed. 

The adjustable feature is only available to users over 18 years old. For underage users, their sensitive content control setting is automatically in the default state of limited content. 

Instagram has a slew of features and policies in place aimed at reducing harmful content on the platform. Most recently, the platform introduced a feature in April to filter out DM requests based on words, emojis, and phrases deemed offensive, after working with anti-bullying and anti-discrimination organizations.

The platform also automatically blocks offensive comments on your posts using machine learning to detect previously reported offensive comments.