Ask HN: What to do when your Instagram account gets suspended?

2 points by buzzdenver 3y ago ↗ HN

I am a very casual IG user and access it monthly usually from a Firefox browser. Don't even have the app downloaded. Few weeks ago I was scrolling, all of a sudden I got redirected to https://www.instagram.com/accounts/suspended and asked for a phone number for a confirmation code, which never gets delivered.

My setup shouldn't have any red flags in it. I access the Internet using Comcast from the US, no VPN; the phone number I gave is a vanilla Verizon number (and tried another one as well); I have tried various browsers, even new installations just to see if things work if I remove all ad blockers and other extensions. Console Log in Devtools has a few errors but none seem like a smoking gun.

So what can a humble Internet user do in this Kafkaesque situation?

4 comments

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codetrotter 3y ago ↗

Give up on IG. Install TikTok.

smoldesu 3y ago ↗

What does TikTok do to remediate this situation?

buzzdenver 3y ago ↗

Aren't IG and TikTok very different tho? I used IG to share pictures of my dog once a year and have no interest in creating short form video.

IG is trying very hard to become TikTok, down to copying them wholesale in the Instagram “Reels” feature.

But yeah it depends on how you were using IG indeed.

For me TikTok replaced IG to a great degree. I used to scroll IG and post photos to IG. Now I scroll TikTok and post videos to TikTok.