Why is NCPCR investigating Meta, Instagram?
The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has summoned Meta officials to address the presence of child sexual exploitation and abuse material (CSEAM) in advertisements on Instagram. Reports from the BBC and the Tech Transparency Project suggest that Meta's automated moderation systems are failing to effectively block this illegal content.
Why it matters
This investigation underscores the ongoing struggle of major social media platforms to regulate harmful content and the limitations of AI-driven moderation systems.
The story so far : The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) summoned Meta officials for a hearing on Wednesday (September 9, 2026) as a part of an inquiry on child sexual exploitation and abuse material (CSEAM) on Instagram. An investigation by British public broadcaster BBC threw up many ads that linked out to CSEAM on other platforms. The IT Ministry has also summoned the company on the issue.
In July, BBC reported that the organisation saw dozens of ads promoting CSEAM on Instagram with a test account. CSEAM is banned around the world, and attracts strict criminal penalties. Meta said in a statement, “Before these cases were brought to our attention, our enforcement systems had already identified and disabled several of the violating ads and the accounts behind them.”
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