This Instagram page shows whether you’ve uploaded any contacts and allows you to delete them. Deleting them will not stop new contacts being added to your phone from being uploaded. The setting can be turned on or off through the settings menu on iOS or Android.
The option to download your data includes photos, comments, profile information, and more. This has to be requested through the Security menu.
Location
You probably use Instagram on your phone. By default, Instagram’s location gathering abilities are turned off, but you’ve probably turned the feature on inadvertently while adding your location to a post or story.
To change this—or at the very least check whether you’ve given it permission—visit the settings on your phone. It can’t be done through the Instagram app.
On Android, navigate to Settings, then tap on Apps and find Instagram. Here you can see whether you’ve given it permission to access your location, microphone, device storage, contacts, and more. You can turn these settings on and off, allowing Instagram access to your location all the time, only while you’re using the app, or never.
If you own an iPhone, the process is similar. Tap your way to the phone’s settings, go to Privacy and then Location Services and find Instagram. Here you can choose whether location tracking is on all the time, when you’re using the app, or off completely.
Control Ads in Stories
As Facebook has tried (successfully) to make more money from Instagram, it has filled it with ads. What you see is all powered, technically, by the parent company. Facebook is the ad server for Instagram, and the two are inseparable.
Instagram shows you ads based on what it and Facebook think you like. This is based on what you do while on Instagram (e.g. liking posts from particular brands) but also what you do on websites and services not owned by Facebook. Facebook's Pixel is a tiny piece of code that’s on almost every website you visit and collects information saying you have visited it. The Pixel gathers data about your activity online and links it to an identifier and that helps decide what ads you’ll be shown.
It’s just one way data is collected that feeds into the company’s bigger advertising machine. “Advertisers, app developers, and publishers can send us information through Facebook Business Tools that they use, including our social plug-ins (such as the Like button), Facebook Login, our APIs and SDKs, or the Facebook pixel,” Facebook’s data policy says. This includes what you buy and the websites you visit.
So what can you do about it on Instagram? The controls are limited. Within the app, though the Settings tab, you can see your ad activity. This shows you the ads you have engaged with—commenting on posts, liking an ad, and watching the majority of an ad, for example. There are also links out of the Instagram app that explain ads on the platform within the Settings tab.
)
