LANSING – Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has joined a bipartisan coalition of 37 attorneys general in urging Instagram to make immediate changes to its newly implemented location-sharing feature. In a letter to Instagram Head Adam Mosseri (PDF), the attorneys general outlined serious public safety and data privacy concerns about the change, which allows users’ precise locations to be displayed on a map. The coalition emphasized the heightened dangers for vulnerable users, including children and survivors of domestic violence, noting that such tools can be exploited by predators, stalkers, and other malicious actors.
“Meta has a responsibility to protect its users, especially children, from online predators,” Nessel said. “This new location-sharing feature undermines safety and could have devastating consequences. I urge Instagram to implement stronger safeguards to protect the privacy and security of young users before it’s too late.”
The letter calls on Instagram to:
-
Ensure that minors cannot enable location-sharing features.
- Send a clear alert to all adult users explaining the feature, outlining its risks, and providing full disclosure of how Instagram will use their location data.
-
For adults who choose to opt in, provide a simple, easy-to-access control to disable location sharing at any time.
The attorneys general stressed that Meta and Instagram must prioritize user safety over product novelty, and that implementing these measures will protect user privacy while allowing informed adults to choose whether to share their location.
In sending this letter, Attorney General Nessel is joined by the attorneys general of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawai’i, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming.
###
|
|
