For over two years we've documented widespread predatory activity + sexualisation, harassment, grooming and exploitation of underage girls on Instagram, and called for changes to keep minors safe on the platform.
Read this blog for a small sample of what we've seen, and why we joined the global call to Facebook to abandon its plans for Instagram Youth: collectiveshout.org/girls_deserve_…
Last year we exposed Instagram after documenting its broadcast of live sex acts to children: naked men masturbating in underage girls' Instagram lives One vicitm was 9 years old.
After the COVID-19 pandemic was declared we were told repeatedly by Instagram's moderators that they couldn't review our reports at all - not even when our reports were about adults who exposed their genitals to little girls.
The reason? Instagram was 'only able to review content with the most potential for harm'. Why - at a time when experts warned about the increased risks for kids from online predators - didn't the actual exploitation of children rate as a priority for Instagram's moderators?
We were pleased to see new measures rolled out earlier this year to improve child safety on Instagram. But we continue to document widespread predatory activity and sexualisation, harassment and grooming of children on the platform every day.
Instagram has not done enough to protect children + young people - girls particularly - from predatory men. Instead it has accommodated predators, aided their connection to underage girls and even normalised the sexualisation and exploitation of minors.
Girls deserve better than the safety measures Instagram has offered to date. We will continue to highlight the ways girls are harmed on Instagram and call on Big Tech platforms to improve child safety.
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“New South Wales model of decriminalisation and deregulation of prostitution has failed to protect workers in the sex industry while empowering profiteers and criminals, so why is Victoria going down the same path?" spectator.com.au/2021/09/why-is…
“A 2015 enquiry into the regulation of brothels in NSW found that drug use, abuse, organised crime and sex trafficking, including minors, remain substantial problems even under full decriminalisation."
"Local Councils are inadequately resourced and trained to deal with organised crime. In many cases, councils found themselves powerless to prevent illegal parlours from opening alongside schools, learning centres, and within residential buildings."
“The federal government is looking to bring on board multinational credit card company Mastercard as part of its move toward developing a digital identity and age verification system." canberratimes.com.au/story/7445505/…
“Mastercard announced on Monday it has joined into a new partnership with the Digital Transformation Agency and is seeking accreditation to become a digital identity service provider."
“[Mastercard] was looking to offer ways for the federal government to achieve an online age verification system, after a parliamentary committee last year recommended one be introduced to curb minors accessing online pornography sites.”
In a move described by the New York Times as a 'rare reversal', Facebook has paused development of its 13-years-and-under platform Instagram Youth. Announcement comes as Facebook faces global condemnation for failing to disclose research demonstrating Instagram’s harms to girls.
From @nytimes:
‘Opposition to Facebook’s plans gained momentum this month when The [Wall Street] Journal @WSJ published articles based on leaked internal documents that showed Facebook knew about many of the harms it was causing.
'Facebook’s internal research showed that Instagram, in particular, had caused teen girls to feel worse about their bodies and led to increased rates of anxiety and depression, even while company executives publicly tried to minimize the app’s downsides.
Why haven’t you stopped the sexualisation, harassment and exploitation of girls by predatory men on @Instagram? Facebook says there’s ‘no place’ for child exploitation on its platforms - why do we see it DAILY? /1
For the past 2 years we have documented widespread predatory activity on Instagram. We have seen some changes to Instagram’s policies + new tools to “keep teens safe”. But girls - teen and even pre teen - are not safe. 2/
We continue to document deeply disturbing activity, happening in plain sight on Instagram:
paedophile forums posing as Instagram accounts (“shout out” pages), scraping content from girls’ personal pages + sharing them with thousands of men.
“All of Prostasia’s goals and campaigns lead to the exact same conclusion: The total normalization and acceptance of pedophilia in wider society.” 4w.pub/prostasia-norm…
In an expose of @ProstasiaInc, Anna Slatz @Slatzism writes, “Protecting children from exposure to sex abuse seems to not just be at the very bottom of Prostasia’s to-do list, it is almost antithetical to its entire existence.”
Despite claiming to be a child protection org, Prostasia core work includes “crusades against child pornography bans, letter-writing campaigns to state representatives demanding child-like sex dolls be kept legal, funding research into ‘fantasy sexual outlets’ for pedophiles.”
In our 2-yr investigation, we've documented the widespread sexualisation, harassment + fetishisation of underage girls by men on Instagram, + the complicity of parents who photograph, share + sell the content.
'They set up subscription-based websites and accounts on content-sharing platforms like Patreon and Boosty to sell images of underage girls wearing bikinis, cosplay costumes, g-strings and lingerie.