On social media networks, more means better. Whether it is more Likes, Followers or Comments, they are more often the currency that translates to more visibility and popularity.
This phenomenon has made many people to purchase services to get those 'currencies', in a way to boost their account to become influencers.
Others have even use automated apps to leave spammy comments, or following then unfollowing people in hopes of growing their audience.
It's like a race to popularity, and it's no longer a secret that such services are popular in their own means.
In a move to make its platform a better place for all of its users, Instagram no longer allow "inauthentic likes, follows and comments from accounts that use third-party apps to boost their popularity."
That includes buying Likes and Followers, and paying for other engagement generated by apps that require a user's Instagram login details in order to operate on their behalf.
"Recently, we've seen accounts use third-party apps to artificially grow their audience," said Instagram in a blog post.
In the policy update, Instagram said that those attempts are violating its Community Guidelines and Terms of Use.
To help it in purging all those fake engagements, Instagram said that it "built machine learning tools" to detect accounts that are growing artificially. Using AI, the self-improving software should help the platform in identifying accounts that use such apps and purge their inauthentic activities.
The algorithms work retroactively, and won't be removing those fake Likes, Followers or Comments accounts have already garnered in the past. The update is just going to prevent them from happening again in the future.
Instagram said that it would notify users about removed Likes, Follows, or Comments.
And those who have unknowingly linked their account to an offending app, are only required to change their password, in order for those services to stop sending them fake engagements, according to the photo and video sharing social network.
For those who keeps on using such third-party apps, will possibly see their "experience impacted."
It’s easy to understand why people pay to boost their engagements.
Users with huge amount of followers or engagements, can appeal brands better. In many ways, those people can charge more for those brands to advertise and promote their products. And there is that psychological element to it: The more followers someone has, the more legitimate he/she is to other users.
But social media companies aren't that fond of these activities.
Twitter for example, has started purging fake accounts for quite some times now. After admitting of its toxic environment, the social media has suspended as many as 70 million accounts between the May and June. The social media did this to make its platform better for all users in general.
As for Instagram, it has long removed fake accounts, but never taken real action against fake engagements before.
The announcement comes amid growing concerns about Facebook's efforts to curb misinformation and manipulation. The most notable was when Facebook received global criticisms after admitting that the Russians have been using the platform to influence public opinion ahead of the 2016 U.S. elections.
Since Instagram is Facebook's, the photo and video-sharing social networking service is under more pressure than ever to police the activity on its platforms.