Real reason celebrities lost millions of followers overnight

Some of the world's biggest celebrities, including Cristiano Ronaldo, Selena Gomez, Kim Kardashian, Lionel Messi, and more lost millions of followers almost overnight on social media.

This comes as Instagram has been rocked by a massive follower purge after Meta removed millions of fake and inactive accounts from the platform in a sweeping crackdown.

As reported by Daily Mail, Cristiano lost around 6.6 million followers, and Selena's account was dropped by 5.4 million. Meanwhile, Kim lost 5.1 million, and Beyonce lost 4.4 million.

Furthermore, Kylie Jenner, Ariana Grande, Khloe Kardashian and Dwayne Johnson were also heavily affected.

According to Meta, this move is part of a "routine process" designed to remove inactive and bot accounts. The statement by the tech company read, "As part of our routine process to remove inactive accounts, some Instagram accounts may have noticed updates to their follower counts."

"Active followers remain unaffected, and any restored suspended account will be included in the count again after verification," it further stated. 

Concluding,  "Thank you for your patience and we apologize for any inconvenience."

It is pertinent to mention that the purge marks one of the biggest bot crackdowns in Instagram history.