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A 16 year-old girl has reportedly killed herself in Malaysia, after posting a poll on her Instagram account asking followers if she should die or not, and 69% of responders voting that she should.
Police in the east Malaysia state Sarawak said the girl, who has not been named, posted the poll on the photo sharing app with the message: “Really Important, Help Me Choose D/L”. After most responders voted for “death”, she killed herself.
Her death prompted a lawyer to suggest that those who voted for her to die could be guilty of abetting suicide.
Ramkarpal Singh, a lawyer and MP in the north-western state of Penang, said: “Would the girl still be alive today if the majority of netizens on her Instagram account discouraged her from taking her own life? Would she have heeded the advice of netizens to seek professional help had they done so?
“Did the encouragement of those netizens actually influence her decision to take her own life? Since attempted suicide is an offence in this country, it follows that abetting one to attempt suicide may be, too.”
Malaysia’s youth and sports minister, Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman, said the tragedy highlighted the need for national-level discussions about mental health in the country. “I am genuinely worried about the state of our youth’s mental health,” he said. “It’s a national issue which must be taken seriously.”
In February Instagram announced that it will launch “sensitivity screens” to block images of self-harm. The move followed the death of British teenager Molly Russell, whose parents believe saw images of suicide and self-harm on the app before she took her own life in 2017, aged 14.
Ching Yee Wong, Head of Communications, Instagram APAC, said: “Our thoughts and prayers are with this young woman’s family.”
“We have a deep responsibility to make sure people using Instagram feel safe and supported. As part of our own efforts, we urge everyone to use our reporting tools and to contact emergency services if they see any behaviour that puts people’s safety at risk.”
This article is more than 3 months old Instagram to launch 'sensitivity screens' after Molly Russell's death
Instagram will introduce “sensitivity screens” to hide images of self-harm in an attempt to protect young people who use the site, the app’s head has announced.
Adam Mosseri, who took over Instagram after the app’s founders departed suddenly in 2018, has promised a series of changes following the death of the British teenager Molly Russell, whose parents believe she took her own life after being exposed to graphic images of self-harm and suicide on Instagram and Pinterest.
The Facebook-owned app already bans posts that promote or encourage suicide or self-harm, Mosseri said, but faces challenges in finding those posts to take them down, as well as ensuring that users can still share imagery related to those topics in ways that allow them to express themselves but do not amount to incitement.
That includes “sensitivity screens” for images of self-harm, which blur the image behind them until the user explicitly indicates they want to view the graphic content. The company has also blocked images of cutting from showing up in search, hashtags or account recommendations. Mosseri said the changes would make it more difficult for people to see those images.
The company is also investing in “engineers and trained content reviewers”, who are working “around the clock to make it harder for people to find self-harm images”, Mosseri said in a comment piece for the Telegraph newspaper.
Mosseri also committed to “better support people who post images indicating they might be struggling with self-harm or suicide”.
“We already offer resources to people who search for hashtags, but we are working on more ways to help, such as connecting them with organisations we work with like Papyrus and Samaritans,” he said.
Mosseri’s promise comes a week after Facebook was issued with an ultimatum by the health secretary, Matt Hancock, to get better at protecting children on Instagram and Facebook’s main app, or face the force of the law.
“It is appalling how easy it still is to access this content online and I am in no doubt about the harm this material can cause, especially for young people,” Hancock wrote in late January. “It is time for internet and social media providers to step up and purge this content once and for all.
“As health secretary, I am particularly concerned about content that leads to self-harm and promotes suicide.
“Suicide is now the leading cause of death for young people under 20. Levels of self-harm are rising among teenage girls in particular. Like any parent, I was horrified this week to learn of 14-year-old Molly Russell, who tragically took her own life. Molly was just two years older than my own daughter is now, and I feel desperately concerned to ensure young people are protected,” Hancock added.
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