Snapchat expands in-app drug education portal in UK

Snapchat has expanded its in-app drug education experience called “Heads Up” to the UK today.

Heads Up was launched in the US earlier this year and is now being brought across the Atlantic to “help educate the UK Snapchat community about the dangers of drugs.”

Episodic content from drug education organisations, Frank and With You will appear when a user searches for certain phrases, which offers people “honest information” about cannabis and MDMA drug-use and peer pressure (see below).

Snapchat is also stepping up its efforts to protect its community from drug sales by increasing its law enforcement team, which liaises with police and other authorities on these issues.

The social media platform has also introduced extra protections for teenage users where strangers will not be able to add them using the “Quick Add” feature unless they  have a certain number of friends in common.

Sanjit Gill, head of public policy UK & Ireland at Snap Inc., said: “We are committed to ensuring that drugs have no place on Snapchat and that our platform continues to be a safe and positive place for our community.

“The measures announced today form part of a holistic approach to addressing drug dealing; ranging from the development of proactive tools to detect and remove drug related content and accounts, and working closely with the police.

“Our new collaboration with Frank and With You complement these measures and will help give young people access to information about the dangers of drugs at a time when they may be considering them.”

Snap announced it had a 114% increase in “enforcement rates against drug-related content” meaning more offending content and accounts were removed and blocked from creating new ones with specific cases referred to law enforcement.

It also said it had a 305% increase in proactive detection of this harmful content and the majority of this is through machine learning and AI technology.

This comes as the UK Government announced its 10-year drugs plan “to cut crime and save lives”.