The social media world has just been put on high alert after Instagram announced that they will be deleting fake accounts and cleaning house. The hammer is also dropping on users who have paid for follower services that spam, or automatically follow for you.
Yup, the day of reckoning has finally come.
Recently, we’ve seen accounts use third-party apps to artificially grow their audience. Every day people come to Instagram to have real experiences, including genuine interactions. It is our responsibility to ensure these experiences aren’t disrupted by inauthentic activity. Starting today, we will begin removing inauthentic likes, follows and comments from accounts that use third-party apps to boost their popularity.
The Instagram Team
Instagram is taking the recent Facebook scandals as a shot across their own bow, and looking into the experience from scared eyes. Instagram’s commitment to keeping the user experience as authentic as possible has been there from the beginning, and this is just another step following that path.
Accounts we identify using these services will receive an in-app message alerting them that we have removed the inauthentic likes, follows and comments given by their account to others. We will also ask them to secure their account by changing their password. People who use these types of apps share their username and password, and their accounts are sometimes used by third-party apps for inauthentic likes, follows and comments. Not only does this introduce bad behavior into the Instagram community, it also makes these accounts less secure.
The Instagram Team
While the ax has already fallen on follower-generating companies like Social Growth and Instagress, there are still a whole host of third-party apps that are on Instagram’s chopping block. Unfortunately, this means that all of those fake accounts people paid to have follow them will go away, the “likes” that were generated will disappear, and all will be right again as if Thanos himself snapped his fingers.
These third-party apps make their money through violating Instagram’s policies to distribute automatic likes, follows, and even messages to new followers. So, watch your Instagram inbox for a kind (but stern) warning from the head honchos to get rid of your follower-generating apps.
It’s time to get content the old fashion way: post funny shit.
