Instagram’s feature, which went live globally on Aug 13, will notify parents when their teen makes repeated attempts over a brief timeframe to look up terms that indicate suicide or self-harm. 

The alerts, which were initially published on Feb. 26, aim to alert parents to the need for support and give them resources to help them deal with the problem, the social media platform, owned by Meta Platforms, said.

For the alerts, parents need to connect their account with their child’s account via the supervision settings in Instagram’s Family Centre hub.

The alerts will be distributed to parents by e-mail, text and WhatsApp (depending on the contact details they provide to the platform) and an in-app notification.

If you are a teen under 16, you will need to get your parent’s permission to change your content setting to less strict on Instagram, and there is an additional layer of monitoring you can choose, with your child’s consent.

The new notifications for parents come through at the “same time” that Instagram’s Suicide and Self-Harm Advisory Group (SHAG) has consulted with to develop the features, Instagram said. 

It was first launched in the US, Britain, Australia, and Canada in March and then in other parts of Europe, Brazil and India in May. 

Meta is also working on such alerts for some AI experiences for parents, it said. These are intended to notify parents if a teen attempts to engage in certain types of conversations related to suicide or self-harm with the Meta AI assistant.