San Francisco, Mar 20 (IANS): In a bid to protect young users, Meta-owned photo-sharing platform Instagram had announced new parental controls in the US.

Parents, tech watchdogs and lawmakers alike have long called for the company to do more to keep teens safe on Instagram, which invites anyone older than 13 to sign up for an account, reports TechCrunch.

To that end, Meta is introducing something it calls "Family Center", a centralised hub of safety tools that parents will be able to tap into to control what kids can see and do across the company's apps, starting with Instagram.

The new set of supervision features lends parents and guardians some crucial transparency into young users' Instagram habits.

The tools will allow parents to monitor how much time a kid spends on the app, be updated about accounts they've followed lately and who has followed them and receive notifications about any accounts they have reported.

Those tools have rolled out on Instagram in the US and are on the way to Meta's VR platform in May and the rest of Meta's apps some time in the coming months, including to global users.