News : AG Bird Joins Coalition Demanding Instagram Respect Privacy & User Safety

Today, Attorney General Brenna Bird joined a bipartisan coalition of 37 states demanding Instagram respect the safety and privacy of Instagram users and add controls to its new location sharing feature. The attorneys general expressed serious concerns over the feature which displays a user's precise location on a map. This feature introduces significant public safety and data privacy concerns-particularly for vulnerable users, including children and survivors of domestic violence.

"Instagram should be concerned for the safety of all users, but in particular for children and victims of abuse, stalking and violence," said Attorney General Bird. "This new location-sharing service poses unacceptable and serious risks for the most vulnerable users, who should be able to use Instagram without putting their lives in jeopardy."

In the letter, the 37 attorneys general ask that Meta, the parent company of Instagram:

• Ensures that minors are NOT allowed to enable location-sharing features.

• Sends a clear alert to all adult users explaining the feature, outlining its risks, and including a comprehensive disclosure of how Instagram intends to use their location data.

• Creates a simple, easy-to-access feature that allows users to disable at any time for those adults who have chosen to opt in to location sharing.

Iowa joined the New Mexico- and Georgia-led letter along with Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Read the full letter here.