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Instagram recently stopped me from liking other people’s posts and adding captions to my own photos.
I wasn’t fully blocked from using my account. I was able to post images to stories and the feed, however, I just couldn’t add a caption. To get around this, I was able to post an image and then swap to my personal account to add the first comment. (I hoped no one noticed the slight change).
I was also unable to like other people’s posts. When I attempted to do it, I got the error message: “Action Blocked. This action was blocked. Please try again later. We restrict certain content and actions to protect our community. Tell us if you think we made a mistake. Then I had two options, to hit OK or the Tell us”.
Fortunately, I could still send direct messages and talk to my friends.
I wondered if I had been shadow banned – so I searched online for the answer.
Here are some of the recommendations I found:
I assumed the ban would only last a couple of weeks – and a break from posting was kind of nice. After a month I started to get more worried, so I did some more research. I started to think I had accidentally used a blocked hashtag or hit a limit.
I clicked on the settings (cog icon), then “Report a Problem” and I wrote them a short but succinct email about my issue.
This restricted access lasted around 6 weeks. Fortunately, one day (about a week later after ‘Reporting a Problem’), without any notification, I was back in business and could use the full functionality of Instagram.
Please leave a comment if you believe you have been shadow banned or restricted on Instagram, and how you resolved it?
Instagram Help:
https://help.instagram.com/
Instagram Platform Policy:
https://www.instagram.com/about/legal/terms/api/