Instagram might soon curb the menace brought about by bots on the platform. The company has started asking some users to provide video selfies taken from various angles of their face to ascertain that they are human.
Bots have become a common fixture in the photo sharing platform, spamming comment sections and harassing users. They are also used to create fake followers so some accounts can appear popular even without real human followers.
Social media consultant Matt Navaara shared a few screenshots explaining the new approach by Instagram, and the same was confirmed by Instagram’s parent company, Meta.
Read: Instagram Suspends Development of Kids Version
Instagram is now using video selfies to confirm users identity
Meta promises not to collect biometric data. pic.twitter.com/FNT2AdW8H2
— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) November 15, 2021
“One of the ways we use video selfies is when we think an account could be a bot. For example, if the account likes lots of posts or follows a ton of accounts in a matter of seconds, video selfies help us determine if there’s a real person behind the account or not.” Instagram said.
Instagram doesn’t use facial recognition, and we don’t use it in video selfies. We introduced video selfies more than a year ago to help confirm that there’s a person behind an account, and not a bot. https://t.co/mQI0oWOGeY
— Instagram Comms (@InstagramComms) November 17, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Instagram reportedly started testing the feature last year before running into some technicalities preventing the rollout. The company says the selfie videos will not be used or posted on the app, as they are simply for verification purposes.
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