Meta announced parents can receive alerts when teens discuss suicide or self-harm with Meta AI on Instagram, Facebook, or Meta Horizons. Parents must opt into supervision tools to select family accounts. The feature supplements existing safety measures where Meta AI directs teens to crisis helplines and encourages reaching out to trusted adults.

Now, Meta will proactively alert supervising parents if a teen's Meta AI chat suggests risk, based on signals developed with experts. All flagged chats are manually reviewed before alerts are sent. If intent is ambiguous, Meta errs on the side of caution. The company aims to detect subtle references and shares expert resources to help parents approach conversations.

The feature is available in the US, Canada, UK, and Australia. Meta currently alerts emergency services for credible suicide risk in Facebook or Instagram posts, making over 19,000 referrals last year. It plans to extend this to Meta AI for imminent risk detection. Resources include the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (call/text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org), 911, or ER for mental health emergencies.