Instagram running ads for child sexual abuse material in India

An investigation by the BBC has found that Meta has been running paid advertisements for child sexual abuse material (CSAM) in India on their Instagram platform.

The BBC’s World Service has discovered adverts using terms such as ‘rape video’ and ‘child video’ that direct people to channels on the Telegram messaging service where users can purchase this material for a little as $1.

Paid advertisements on Instagram are only published once they are approved by the platform’s moderation tools. When the BBC reported one of the adverts to Meta they responded within 24 hours to say that that the advert did not violate their community standards. However, Meta did later say that they had disabled several adverts and suspended the accounts behind them.

Telegram said that they had removed more than 274,000 groups and channels that promote child sexual abuse material in 2026 already.

The BBC started their investigation after noticing that Instagram was promoting sexually suggestive material even if the user had not searched for it, including posts with women in revealing clothing and using sexual innuendos.

Having set up an alias account, they started following some of these accounts and within a week Instagram began showing adverts with adults and children in sexually suggestive situations.

The distribution of adult pornography and child sexual abuse material are criminal offences in India, and the BBC have reported all the adverts and channels to Indian authorities. Meta’s own policy says that adverts should not show adult nudity or content that sexually exploits or endangers children.

Meta told the BBC that “no system is perfect, and our review process may not detect all policy violations”. They continued: “We continue to run proactive detection technology on ads once they're live, and anyone can report an ad to us that they think breaks our rules” adding in a statement to the BBC: “Child exploitation is a horrific crime and Meta works aggressively to fight it on our apps.”