Meta expands parental supervision tools with AI self‑harm alerts for teens

Meta is rolling out new parental‑supervision features for its Threads app in the United States next week, giving guardians time‑spending insights, daily limits, sleep‑mode controls and tagging rules for teen accounts. The same family‑center framework underlies its broader teen‑safety suite.

In parallel, Meta has launched an AI‑driven safety alert that notifies parents when a teen mentions suicide or self‑harm in conversations with the platform’s chatbot. The feature, live in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, sends a notification after a human reviewer confirms the flagged content and includes expert‑crafted guidance for parents. Meta plans a global rollout by the end of the year. Earlier, a similar system flagged risky public content, directing more than 19,000 cases to emergency services worldwide.

The updates aim to give families clearer oversight of teen activity across Meta’s apps while addressing growing concerns about adolescent mental‑health risks on social platforms.