Meta Technologies Inc is to trial new technology that blurs nude images of people under eighteen in an attempt to stop the rise in sextortion scams and bullying.
Zuckerberg's social media image-sharing platform Instagram will introduce the technology for direct messages with AI tools to determine whether they contain nudity.
Anyone under 18 will have technology switched on automatically with parents also being notified to get their children to utilise the new software.
"Because the images are analyzed on the device itself, nudity protection will also work in end-to-end encrypted chats, where Meta won't have access to these images – unless someone chooses to report them to us," the company said in a statement.
Instagram direct messages currently are not encrypted but Meta said plans are in train for this to happen.
Meta is also developing new methods to identify sextortion scams with pop-up warnings to potential victims.
Sextortion involving blackmail with the threat of intimate pictures being publicly posted has become a sophisticated organised crime as well as being linked to suicides and self-harm.
Meta was sued in the US last year by 33 US states alleging the company had failed to warn about the dangers of abuse on its platforms.