“There used to be a geography to crime where things happened in specific locations. But there are a lot of other people who’ll take that image and share it in ways that the original owner would never consent to.” In 2014 Bartlett wrote a book called The Dark Net where he tried to find and understand the darkest human behaviours in online forums and communities. “The prevalence of this kind of behaviour online is hard to put into words,” says author and tech expert Jamie Bartlett. What Maxine noticed is not an isolated incident. One bio read: “got deleted, I always come back. Some also brazenly did not care about being reported. Call me on chat (9 to 13 year old girls)”. The descriptions in the bios say things like: “Come to a place to enjoy the little things on sale and on offer” and “I have several mega links to exchange. Kik is known for preserving user anonymity where people can register without even providing a telephone number. Wickr is an instant messaging app that allows users to exchange end-to-end encrypted messages which expire. Accounts also provided details of more anonymous platforms like Snapchat, Kik and Wickr indicating that Instagram is an entry point before connecting on more ephemeral spaces where it’s harder to be tracked down. The term “mega links” is frequently used in the usernames, comments and bios. There was a pattern to the language being used on the sample of 53 accounts. GLAMOUR has seen a list of 53 Instagram accounts that Maxine has reported in the past few days and has contacted Instagram to establish whether Maxine and her friends have uncovered a network of predators. They follow, like and comment on each other's pages and Instagram serves you similar accounts to follow.” Once you start looking into it you find that so many of them are connected. What’s on their publicly available Story is one thing, but god only knows what’s being shared in their DMs. “They use hashtags like #adorablebaby and #cutebaby.
“These people are working together,” she says.
Maxine believes that the people behind these accounts are operating in a coordinated way. Overall in terms of how many accounts I’ve reported, there are hundreds. “One of the images was of a little girl fully dressed sitting with her legs slightly apart with an inappropriate caption saying ‘open your legs wider little girl’. They were clearly not his own kids,” she says. “I feel physically sick just thinking about it. Message me.’ Maxine clicked onto the man’s account and found that he’d been sharing images of a range of different children on his Instagram Story. “One day I got a message from a mum saying ‘block this man’.” The message was accompanied by a screenshot of the man’s Instagram account with a bio that read ‘I like girls and kids. “I’m part of a few WhatsApp groups with other mums,” she tells me. But then something happened which changed Maxine’s point of view and behaviour overnight. She sees it as a powerful platform to share beautiful images. It’s a happy and helpful space where she can share advice and experiences with other parents and be part of the mummy blogger community. She posts cute pics with her baby wearing a range of stylish outfits in scenic locations. Photographers glamour galleries.As a new mother to an eight-month-old boy, mummy blogger Maxine’s Instagram page is idyllic.
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