Social media platform, Instagram has announced that from today it will begin to remove inauthentic likes, follows and comments from accounts that use third-party apps to boost their popularity. The company has built machine learning tools to help identify accounts that use these services and remove the inauthentic activity. The use of apps that generate inauthentic likes, follows and comments violate Instagram's Community Guidelines and Terms of Use.

Accounts that Instagram identify to be using these services will receive an in-app message alerting them that the inauthentic likes, follows and comments given by their account to others have been removed. Instagram will also ask users to secure their account by changing their password. People who use these types of apps share their username and password, and their accounts are sometimes used by third-party apps for inauthentic likes, follows and comments. Not only does this introduce bad behaviour into the Instagram community, it also makes these accounts less secure.

Some users may have unknowingly shared their login credentials with a third-party app. If they receive an in-app message, they must simply change their password to revoke any third party access to their account. These new measures will be ongoing, and accounts that continue to use third-party apps to grow their audience may see their Instagram experience impacted.

Since the early days, Instagram has auto-detected and removed fake accounts to protect its community. The company will have more updates in the coming weeks on additional measures it's taking to tackle inauthentic activity on Instagram.

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