[53473] Wave of fake account deletions on Instagram: Ronaldo and Messi lost millions of followers

A blow to social media leaders: Ronaldo and Messi lost millions of followers following an Instagram account cleanup

Following an extensive move by Instagram to delete fake accounts and bots from the platform, two of the world's biggest soccer stars suffered a significant drop in their number of followers. According to the report by MrVarzesh, the move led to a drop of 18 million followers for Cristiano Ronaldo and 8 million followers for Lionel Messi.

Football Bartar ࡆ Premier League 360 channel elaborated on the case, noting that for Ronaldo, it is a drop from 684 million to 666 million followers. The article states that according to the 'Football Bartar' report, "The Portuguese star, who is considered the person with the largest number of followers on Instagram, faced a drop of 18 million followers following the new account cleaning policy."

Reports indicated that claims that a significant portion of Ronaldo's followers are "robots and fake accounts" had been raised in the past by many users on the network, but until now there had been no conclusive evidence. It seems that the platform's latest move has verified these concerns and exposed the scope of the "fake followers" of the superstars.