(The Center Square) – Privacy and safety risks are cited in a letter to the leader of Instagram penned by attorneys general from New Mexico and Georgia and joined by North Carolina’s Jeff Jackson.
Thirty-seven states are represented in the call to protect children.
“Our children’s safety comes first,” said Jackson, a first-term Democrat in the office and former member of the U.S. House of Representatives. “Instagram needs to do some clean up on its location-sharing feature so we can keep children and victims safe – and it needs to do so now.”
Instagram introduced a new feature allowing “users’ precise real-time locations to be displayed on a map,” a release from New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez says. He added it “poses significant privacy and safety risks – especially for vulnerable groups, including children and survivors of domestic violence.”
Three calls to action are requested in the letter.
The prosecutors ask for assurance “minors are not allowed to enable location-sharing features; send a clear alert to all adult users explain the feature, outlining the risks, and including a comprehensive disclosure of how Instagram intends to use their location data; and for those adults who have chosen to opt in to location sharing, allow a simple, easy-to-access feature that allows users to disable at any time.”
Jackson’s release says, “It is important to note that even if you turn off the new location-sharing feature, Instagram may still collect your location information on its own for advertising and other purposes. Please refer to Instagram’s help center on how to prevent the app from collecting your location data.”
