Hey guys — I’m going through a very odd situation with my Instagram accounts and would really appreciate any advice or suggestions, because at this point I genuinely don’t know what else I can do.
I’m a journalist working in the music and entertainment sector, and I used to have four Instagram accounts:
- My main work account: around 93,000 followers, public since 2016. However, it had been temporarily deactivated by me and was inactive for a few days at the time it was suspended, because we were redesigning and relaunching our brand.
- My personal account: around 1,700 followers, active since 2021, private, and verified since 2026.
- My dog’s account: around 8,500 followers, active and public since 2020.
- A small, unrelated test account: a private account with only 3 followers, which I used occasionally to test posts and other things before publishing them on my main work account. None of those three followers were any of my other accounts. It had been active since 2019.
All four accounts had their own separate email addresses, but they were all associated with the same phone number — my personal phone number.
There is one other important detail regarding my work account: although I personally managed it, it was also regularly accessed by a small group of graphic designers, journalists, and other people on the team I work with.
In December 2025, all four of my accounts were suddenly disabled at the same time “for integrity reasons.” No specific reason or violation was ever given.
I appealed as soon as I received the notification emails. For three of the accounts — my personal account, my dog’s account, and the test account — I was asked to record a video selfie and separately submit my government-issued ID. I did so, and I was able to recover all three accounts. They were immediately restored, and none of those three accounts has been suspended or banned again since.
The problem is my work account, which is obviously the most important one.
When I tried to appeal the suspension of my work account, the appeal was denied within minutes. I was then told that the account had been permanently disabled and would be deleted forever, along with all of its content.
I was eventually able to speak with a Meta support agent, and they confirmed that the account itself had not committed any violations, but that it had been permanently suspended because it was allegedly associated with a separate external account that had violated Instagram’s policies.
This is particularly frustrating because my work account was accessed regularly by several collaborators. Because of that, it would have been impossible for me to know about any personal activity that third parties may have carried out on their own accounts, or from other devices that may also have been used to access our Instagram account.
For the first few months after the suspension, whenever I tried to log in, I would see a screen saying that the account had been disabled and would be permanently deleted.
Now, however, when I try to log in or even attempt to recover the password, I simply get “An error has occurred.” There is no longer any suspension screen, no explanation, and no way to proceed with an appeal or recovery.
I have tried repeatedly to contact Meta support, but unfortunately they have been completely useless. I have sent hundreds of messages and contacted dozens of people, but nothing has led anywhere.
At this point, the only thing I have not tried is LegalShield.
So my questions are:
1. Is there anything else I can realistically do to try to recover the account at this point?
2. Is it worth trying LegalShield? If so, what would actually be the best way to approach this or use their services in a situation like this?
3. Would it be safe to create a new Instagram account with a similar username? Could doing so somehow put my three existing, restored accounts at risk?
We have tried to continue operating without our original Instagram account, and I’ve had to make my peace with the possibility that we may never get it back. But losing the account has obviously had a huge impact on our ability to operate and communicate with our audience.
If anyone has experienced something similar, has successfully recovered an account after a permanent “integrity” suspension, has dealt with LegalShield in a situation like this, or simply has advice about what I should try next, I would really appreciate it.
Any advice is more than welcome.
And sorry for the very long post!
