BOGOTA, Colombia — Colombia’s Constitutional Court last week ruled in favor of adult performer Esperanza Gómez in her legal battle against Meta over repeated suspensions of her Instagram account.
According to the ruling, the court found that Meta had not treated the performer equally “compared to profiles with similar posts.”
“If social media platforms use offline activities as criteria for content moderation, they must clearly state these criteria in their community standards,” the court’s statement said. “Due process must also be allowed to reasonably challenge the social media platform's decision.”
Gómez originally sued what was then Instagram Colombia and Facebook Colombia in 2018 for the suspension and loss of three Instagram accounts. Two lower courts rejected that litigation.
In 2022, Gómez filed an appeal against the social media giant with the Constitutional Court, in which she asserted that the Instagram account deactivations cost her millions of followers and disrupted her “right to work.”
Last week’s ruling, issued by Judge Natalia Ángel Cabo, also included three instructions to Meta. In order to clarify rules for content moderation and ensure they are not discriminatory, Meta must create a visible electronic channel for judicial notifications in Colombia, ensure its policies are available in Spanish and on a unified website, and review and adjust Instagram's terms of use and privacy policy so that users are clearly aware of the mechanisms for challenging moderation decisions.
"I continued without listening to the people who told me that I would never win a lawsuit against a giant, and today we are triumphing," Gómez posted on X. "We must know how to defend our rights when they are violated."
XBIZ has frequently reported on performers and creators' struggles to navigate Instagram's confusing standards and inconsistent enforcement of its policies.
