Instagram may be one of the world’s most popular social media services, but unlike Twitter or Facebook, the platform tends to largely remain ambivalent about current events and politics.
Not so with coronavirus. As reported by TechCrunch, Instagram will leverage its popularity to offer advice about the novel coronavirus and how to stay safe during the pandemic.
Specifically, it will place a prompt at the top of your feed with a link to information from the World Health Organization (WHO) and local public health authorities. These prompts will appear “in counties that have seen significant impact from the virus,” according to TechCrunch.
The company is also fighting disinformation by hiding coronavirus-related augmented reality effects unless they were made with help from established health organizations. Instagram already fact-checks false information about coronavirus and lists official health sources atop search results.
Instagram has over 1 billion monthly active users, so even small gestures like these can have a major impact. Stay safe, friends.
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