Instagram’s algorithm brought shocking images to the forefront for a while. Minors were also shown gruesome videos on Meta’s platform.
Instagram promoted violent and downright gruesome videos in reels’ feed last night, mainly among young users. This was reported by VRT after reports from young people to NWS.NWS.NWS, but the problem did not only occur in our country. Worldwide, people were confronted with unsolicited shocking videos of fights, murder and even a man being trampled by an elephant.
In violation of conditions
The images violated Meta’s condition and settings around sensitive content indicated by users themselves. Yet unsuspecting people scrolling through Instagram’s Explore feature or Reels were shown such images. VRT linked in the initial piece to Tele-Onthaal (phone number 106) or Awel for Young People (phone number 102) for people in need of a conversation after seeing a gruesome video.
Meta has since apologized and says the problem has been fixed. “We have fixed a bug that caused some users to see content in their Instagram posts that should not be recommended,” it sounds.
About what exactly the problem was, and how the system could present potentially traumatizing videos to young and old alike, the company resolves nothing. Moreover, it took Meta a while to communicate about the problem at all, even after international coverage of it.
‘No link to scaled-back moderation’
Meta, under pressure from US President Trump, is drastically scaling back its rules around content moderation on all platforms, initially in the US. From now on, racist and transphobic content will no longer violate Meta’s terms of service. The gruesome images that users were now seeing came from accounts with names like BlackPeopleBeingHurt.
While Meta does not feel inclined to offer transparency on how the problem could have occurred, a spokesperson is on hand to state that it has nothing to do with the updated moderation policy. Whether that claim is true is impossible to verify. The fact is that Meta previously indicated it wanted to tinker with automatic moderation algorithm to make it more tolerant.
Although Meta is light on the incident, people including young people worldwide have seen images that can be traumatizing. This is not the first time Instagram’s algorithms have failed, but presumably the most serious. In the past, Instagram has presented pornography to users who followed young content creators. Yet the platform remains immensely popular, even with advertisers whose content was interspersed with mutilations and murder last night.