Meta’s Instagram showed paid ads promoting escort services and sex work, CBS News investigation finds
Meta has taken action to remove paid advertisements on its Instagram platform that promoted escort and sex work services on the Telegram messaging app in the U.S. and other countries. CBS News uncovered several paid advertisements on Meta’s Instagram stories feature that advertised opportunities to meet women with URL links leading to the Telegram platform. One such account, Royal Garden Club, with over 100,000 followers, marketed itself as a “premium dating agency for wealthy men” and directed users to both a website and a Telegram channel.
Following the discovery, Meta spokesperson Erin Logan confirmed that the company had removed the accounts associated with the advertisements and disabled the ad accounts for violating Meta’s content moderation policies. The company also banned the administrators of the ad accounts from advertising on its social media platforms.
Meta’s action is in line with its human exploitation policy, which prohibits content that promotes or benefits from commercial sexual activity. Additionally, Meta’s adult sexual solicitation policy prohibits content that offers or provides methods of contact for prostitution.
Royal Garden Club’s Telegram channel boasted access to “over 7,000 girls worldwide for fun dates, relationships, and hot sex,” including a “VIP lifetime” offer of $8,000 featuring top models, bloggers, actresses, athletes, magazine cover girls, and adult stars. The channel claimed to be a “full-service escort agency operating legally” and pointed to its registration under R GARDEN LLP in the United Kingdom.
When contacted for comment, an anonymous moderator for the Royal Garden Club channel declined to provide details about the company’s operations or how it was able to advertise on Instagram. Another paid ad on Instagram, promoted by an account called men.s_dreams, directed users to a Telegram channel offering to connect them with beautiful girls willing to travel worldwide. The channel posted profile pictures of women along with messages in Russian and English.
Despite Meta’s strict content moderation policies, the messaging app Telegram has a reputation for a hands-off approach to content moderation. The platform’s policies primarily focus on banning illegal pornographic content and activities deemed illegal in most countries.
In recent months, Meta has faced challenges in combating sexualized paid advertisements on its platforms, including ads promoting “nudify” apps that create sexually explicit deepfake images. To address this issue, Meta filed a lawsuit against a prominent nudify app maker to prevent them from advertising on its platforms.
As the issue of inappropriate content continues to plague social media platforms, it is essential for companies like Meta to remain vigilant in enforcing their content moderation policies to protect users from harmful and exploitative content.
