More so, other features such as group messaging, inbox filtering, and more advanced message controls will be available with a later release. So, if you are looking to block a follower or mutual from messaging you, you will be able to only block them on Threads, which will also block them on Instagram.
In order to control them from messaging you, you will have to choose whether or not you follow the user. At its launch, DMs will only be available for users who are 18 or above, and in most markets where Threads is available, except for Japan, Australia, the UK, and the EU.
With this addition of the DMs, Threads will become more competitive with other platforms that already have the ability to text, such as Bluesky and X. On those platforms, users can engage one another directly on the platform or even in group chats.
Yet, while X is working on creating encrypted direct messages within X Chat, Threads has no intention of securing its private messaging feature.
(Image Credits: Threads)Threads VP of Product, Emily Dalton Smith, said, “We’re not encrypting our DMs”. Also adding “It’s really about just connecting directly and talking to people about whatever is happening now, which I think makes encryption less core to the experience,” as TechCrunch reported.
On the other hand, she said that DMs are meant to build on the community that people have created in the public space, a social media network that is shaped to be entirely different from its parent app, Instagram, she pointed out.
(Image Credits: Threads)“One thing that’s been particularly exciting is that we have seen that people are building their own graphs on Threads,” she said. “They’re building up what we think of as an interest graph that is new and distinct from the social graph that underlies their account on Instagram.”
Meta also said that despite having been built on top of Instagram’s social graph, over a third of the people who are using Threads daily have less than a 50% overlap between theri Instagram connections and the ones from Threads.
“Instagram is really for creativity and Threads is really for perspectives,” Smith noted.
(Image Credits: Threads)
Also worth noting is the fact that users are following different sets of people across Instagram and Threads and are engaging in different interests and conversations.
Due to the growing disconnect between the apps, Meta also aims to test other ways in which people can use threads without having an Instagram account. Now, the app is currently testing to see the ability for users to create an account with their Facebook account for Europe, and also to have the ability to create a Thrads-only account. And, also to acces Threads without having been logged in at all.
