Creators Are Turning To Shady Instagram Dealers To Restore Their Suspended Accounts

Jade Schulz for BuzzFeed News In January 2021, the Instagram account for Julia Rose’s magazine, ShagMag, got banned from the platform.Rose received a message saying that the account for the online pinup publication had violated Instagram’s rules regarding nudity and impersonation. She had tried to play by the rules, but her posts had been reported and suspended multiple times for alleged nudity. She said she reached out to Instagram to appeal but had no success.For influencers like Rose who rely on Instagram for the promotion of their work as well as sponsorship deals, losing an account can be a massive blow to their income, leaving them desperate to get it back at any cost. But Rose had one more option. After her appeals to Instagram went unanswered, a friend put her in touch with a man who told her he could help her get her account back — for a price.The man claimed he had a connection to a supervisor at Facebook, which owns Instagram. He sent her a contract saying he could restore the account, as well as her personal account, which had also been banned for alleged nudity, in exchange for $65,000 and a 2.5% stake in her…
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