Many users have
been asked by Instagram to provide a video selfie taken from multiple angles of
their face to verify that they’re a real person, according to screenshots
posted on Twitter by social media consultant Matt Navarra. The social network
has long struggled with bot accounts, which can leave spam messages, harass
people, or be used to increase popularity or fan numbers. The following tweet
from Meta-owned Instagram states that it asks for suspicious accounts to verify
that they are human, not bots.

According
to XDA Developers, the company started testing this feature last year but faced
technical problems.

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Another
Twitter columnist, Bettina Makalintal, posted a screenshot of a help screenshot
where you took a video of yourself – again emphasizing that it looks at
“all the angles of your face” to prove that you are a real person and
shows that the confirmation screen is displayed by multiple people.

Instagram posted on
Twitter that accounts with suspicious behavior (such as following a tone of
account immediately) may be asked to take a photo of themselves. The company
also claimed that the feature does not use facial expressions, and said
Instagram teams review videos.

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This move may
surprise some, given the recent announcement of Meta that it will shut down one
of its face recognition features. The company has, however, been shutting down
some features of Facebook, not the use of Meta facial recognition altogether. A
message from Instagram states that the video will not apply face recognition
and that it will be deleted after 30 days.

The Meta promise
not to store or send data may not reassure other users who do not already trust
Meta/Facebook. A hacker had earlier allowed attackers to access Instagram users
so-called birthday information (which you will need to provide soon to use the
app) with just a DM. Well, Instagram did not promise to delete that birthday
information as it said it would do with the video you took, but it would be
difficult to blame people (especially minors or those who want to remain
anonymous) for feeling uncomfortable providing that data.