Instagram accounts fuel Ceuta crisis with paid crossing advice
Dozens of Instagram profiles are charging hundreds of pounds to advise migrants on how to cross from Morocco to the Spanish enclave of Ceuta.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
- Dozens of Instagram accounts offer paid advice for illegal border crossings
- Scammers charge hundreds of pounds for routes from Morocco to Ceuta
- Deceptive videos portray dangerous sea journeys as safe and easy
- Meta removed several profiles following BBC reports on human smuggling
This weekend, Mohammed, a Moroccan man in his twenties, plans to travel from Morocco to the neighboring Spanish enclave of Ceuta on the northern tip of Africa, inspired by numerous videos on Instagram that portray the journey as effortless.
He contacted several of these Instagram accounts, and one responded, claiming to have helped many people and offering advice on how to cross for hundreds of pounds. This follows an incident last month when roughly 78,000 migrants from Morocco arrived by sea in Ceuta within hours, resulting in 100 deaths according to the Mayor of Ceuta.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
The BBC's Top Comment podcast identified dozens of Instagram profiles depicting the short swim around the Morocco-Ceuta border fence as safe and easy. In reality, people have drowned attempting the crossing and had to take much longer routes, while the accounts wrongly promoted Ceuta as a viable path to mainland Europe.
This situation illustrates how social media algorithms can be manipulated by emotive content to exploit vulnerable individuals seeking migration. Perpetrators easily set up accounts to capitalize on desperate aspirations, highlighting ongoing challenges in content moderation for major tech platforms.
Investigations revealed that nearly 40 of these profiles used variations of the term Haraga—referring to migrants destroying identity documents—along with Spanish flag profile pictures and international dialing codes for Morocco and Spain.
"We have a team monitoring the situation in Ceuta in real time and removing content that violates our policies - including content that offers to provide, facilitate or seek human smuggling services"
Meta
After the BBC contacted Meta, the parent company of Instagram, several of the identified profiles were removed from the platform for violating policies against facilitating human smuggling services.
Source: BBC World
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