Snap said that after a long search it hired
Jacqueline Beauchere, who will represent its safety work to regulators,
lawmakers and partners and help advise on new policies and initiatives.
Beauchere was at Microsoft for more than 20
years including as its chief online safety officer.
Child safety advocates and US lawmakers have
raised alarms on a wide range of issues faced by users of online platforms
including mental health impacts and potential abuses from bullying to child
sexual exploitation.
"We are committed to helping parents,
stakeholders and advocates understand how young people experience our products
and how we approach critical issues around safety and trust," Snap's vice
president of global policy Jen Stout said in a statement.
"There is no one better suited to help us
accomplish this than Jacqueline, and this work will only become more important
as we deepen our focus into augmented reality and the future of
computing," she said. Beauchere will report to Stout.
Major tech firms are racing to develop smart
devices and augmented reality offerings. These raise new challenges around
safety and privacy, for example, how such products might invade other people's
private spaces or how companies handle information gathered through these
devices.
Snap this year launched Augmented Reality (AR)
glasses, though they are offered only to AR creators. Facebook Inc last week
unveiled its first smart glasses.
Though Snap's focus on photo-messaging
provides fewer mechanisms for viral content than other social media sites, it
faces pressures to handle safety issues for a young user base. The platform is
also used by children aged 9-12 despite age limit rules, according to a report
by nonprofit Thorn in May.
Stout said in an interview with Reuters that
Snap is developing more proactive technologies to prevent under 13s from
signing up for the app.
She said it is also revamping its in-app
reporting tools to give users more detailed updates when they report platform
abuses. Snap also said it would add more safety features to its Snap Map, which
lets users share their location with friends.
Online platforms' approaches to young users
have been under scrutiny from US lawmakers, who have criticized Facebook's
Instagram over plans to build a kids-focused app.
This week, a Wall Street Journal report
highlighted Instagram's internal findings on the app's negative effects on
young users' wellbeing.
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