Meta staff reportedly acknowledged restrictions on Lula's Instagram accounts during Brazil election

Internal messages from Meta employees have reportedly admitted that Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's Instagram accounts were negatively affected by restrictions during the country's election period, according to media reports.

Brazilian newspaper Folha de S Paulo reported on Friday that the messages, which it said it had reviewed, also showed the platform recommending the profile of Lula's challenger, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, along with his WhatsApp channel.

Meta told Reuters that the technical problems mentioned in the report had already been made public, and that the internal discussions referred only to the seriousness of those issues rather than any political bias. The company said any claim that it favoured one side was untrue.

Lula, the left-wing incumbent, is due to face right-wing challenger Bolsonaro in a presidential runoff on October 25, after the senator performed better than expected in the first round of voting earlier this month.

The report followed a ruling on Thursday by a Brazilian electoral court, which ordered Meta to take immediate steps to ensure equal treatment of both candidates ahead of the runoff vote.

The order came after Lula filed a complaint accusing Meta, which owns Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, of using biased algorithms and AI-based restrictions that favoured Bolsonaro.

Justice Marco Aurelio Bellizze ruled that Meta must not reduce the spread of political content, limit searches or remove posts in ways that create an imbalance between the two candidates, and ordered the company to make sure its AI tools apply the same standards to both campaigns.