On December 1, Ali Karimli, leader of the opposition party Popular Front reported his personal Instagram profile, taken down by Instagram without any notification.
This is not the first time Karimli’s Instagram profile is targeted. However, it was the first time, a fake account was created in his name in order to take down his original account.
On December 4, Karimli received a text message from Instagram with the following message: “Your Instagram account temporarily disabled. Please confirm your personal account.” The message contained a link, which navigated you to a picture of a man wearing a suit (unrelated to the leader of the opposition party).
Karimli said, he never had his personal mobile number associated with an Instagram account and he suspected that whoever was behind the attack, set up an account in his name, registering it to his number. It is possible it was this disabled account that was used to report his original account on the grounds of impersonating the original user.