Earlier this year, Ofcom launched a separate inquiry over the company’s compliance with laws that require it to provide the regulator with information around its services.

Instagram’s ‘Instants’ is at the centre of a fresh Ofcom investigation in the UK over concerns that Meta did not properly assess the feature for child safety before launch.

The social media giant unveiled the Instants feature to UK users in May. Instants is accessible via the direct messaging section of Instagram and allows users to share photos and videos taken directly from the app.

Content captured via Instants is automatically broadcast. It can only be viewed by other users once and cannot be captured in screenshots.

UK law requires user-to-user service providers to carry out risk assessments around illegal content and child safety. Ofcom, in its investigation, is attempting to establish whether Meta failed in its legal obligations to test the Instants feature on those grounds before launching it to users.

If Meta failed in its duties, the UK airwaves regulator can impose fines of up to £18m or 10pc of qualifying worldwide revenue – whichever is greater. For Meta, which made more than $200bn in revenue in 2025, the fine would be hefty.

In a statement to news publications, a Meta spokesperson said that the company “conducted a risk analysis and briefed Ofcom about this feature on a number of occasions before launching it”.

Earlier this year, Ofcom launched a separate inquiry into Meta over the company’s compliance with laws that require it to provide the regulator with information around its services.

Ofcom has recently investigated other online platforms in the country, including TikTok, X and 4Chan.

In January, it closed a case involving Snap, after the company carried out thorough risk assessments of its user-to-user features. Ofcom was concerned that the company’s assessments did not reflect the accuracy of the likelihood that Snapchat could be used to commit or facilitate a crime.

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