Instagram has blocked searches for #democrats and other political hashtags

Instagram blocked searches related to a number of political hashtags, including #democrats, #democrat, #jan6th, #republicans and a number of other terms on Tuesday. Instead, users who searched for these hashtags were greeted with a notice saying “We have hidden these results” because they “may contain sensitive content.”

It’s not clear exactly how many search terms were affected, but users on Reddit have reported this Dozens of signs It was unsearchable. Meta spokesman Andy Stone blamed an unspecified “issue”. job On Threads he said the company is working to fix the problem.

The timing, just days after Mark Zuckerberg sat in the front row at President Donald Trump’s inauguration, fueled speculation that the “affair” was politically motivated. Zuckerberg recently moved to end Meta’s Fact checking software,back off Content moderation standards Which prohibits dehumanizing language and insults targeting immigrants and LGBT people. The company also closed internally Institutional diversity programs. However, Stone said the issue affected “a number of different hashtags on Instagram, not just those on the left.”

In fact, there appears to be some inconsistency in what has been banned. Democrats and Republicans were reportedly affected, but Republicans were watchable. Users reported that #constitution, #johnoliver, and #queer were also not viewable. It now appears that Meta has addressed most of the hashtags in question, though the company has not explained what the “issue” is.

Notably, this is not the first time Instagram has inexplicably blocked hashtag searches. Meta has banned hashtags related to LGBTQ content, calling them “sensitive content.” For several months. The company said earlier this year that was an error, noting that “we do not consider LGBTQ+ terms to be sensitive under our policies.” In 2020, Instagram briefly blocked users from sharing posts using the hashtag #blacklivesmatter, and the company said that was a mistake and blamed it. Spam detection Features.