Instagram wants to use facial scan to prevent spam

Instagram is working on a new user authentication system. With this system, the company wants to scan your face before you can create an account or post a message. This ‘feature’ is supposed to reduce spam bots on the social media platform.

Software and privacy

A social media consultant from Great Britain, Matt Navarra, comes with the news that there will be an account registration in Instagram. In this, the user of a relevant social media account has to make a video of himself. In this video, you should turn your face in front of the camera a few times, Instagram algorithms can then check if you are the right person and if you are a person at all.

The videos and facial recognition would be processed in a closed system and should be deleted within 30 days. For example, the videos are not posted on Instagram and are not visible to other users of the social media platform, it is reported.

meta

For its facial recognition software, Instagram uses technology and algorithms that have been used by parent company Meta for some time. Instagram itself also used the software before. The Face Regognition system could ensure that people were tagged in photos, that you could find photos in which you appeared or that people received a message if someone posted a photo that turned out to be you.

About two weeks ago, Meta announced that it would stop with this automatic facial recognition. A day later, however, the company announced that the software was still in the metaverse want to use. With the new authentication in Instagram, the company would now like to continue to use the software, albeit with a different function.

Will it work and when will it come?

These types of facial recognition systems work with algorithms. These algorithms look at the features of a face and divide it into different parts. Because Instagram will probably ask you to post a video of your face, it should be more difficult for spam bots, among others, to circumvent the software through, for example, a photo. Because you should turn your face, you show multiple parts of your face.

Various authorities and experts also state that the facial recognition of, for example, Meta could violate people’s privacy and that rules for using the software are often not clear. You can read more about this in this article. At the moment Instagram has not yet turned on authentication, the company is reportedly still working hard on it.

What do you think of this news? Let us know in the comments below this article.