Fake Instagram accounts aren’t new and if you are an avid Instagram user, you might notice that every now and then you might get these weird blank accounts or accounts advertising for porn or other products that start following you. There are also services that allegedly help you gain more followers.
According to a report from Business Insider, it seems that Instagram has had enough of these fake accounts and are cracking down on that behavior, starting with the closing of a service called Instagress. This is a pretty popular service amongst Instagrammers who pay $10 a month to get “real” Instagram followers.
In a post on its website, Instagress writes, “Sad news to all of you who fell in love with Instagress: by request of Instagram we were forced to close our web-service.” While Instagram refused to comment, a spokesperson did link Business Insider to Instagram’s developer policy which prohibits third-party developers from selling Instagram data.
This isn’t the first time Instagram is purging fake accounts, and recently Facebook themselves have been working at cracking down on fake accounts as well. That being said, fake accounts will always continue to exist but we suppose with Instagram keeping a watchful eye, hopefully it won’t be happening quite as frequently.