Vatican Launches Investigation Into How Popes Official Account Liked Photo Of A Model
The Vatican said it was seeking explanations on Instagram after Pope Francis’ official account liked a photo of a scantily clad Brazilian model.
It’s unclear when Natalia Garibotto’s photo was endorsed by the Pope’s verified account, but the “like” was still visible on November 13 before it was unliked the next day, according to the Catholic News Agency (CNA ).
Garibotto, who has 2.4 million followers on Instagram, joked about the publicity “At least I’m going to heaven.”
COY Co, Garibotto’s management company, also took full advantage of the publicity and reposted the image on its own Instagram account last Friday saying the company had “received the OFFICIAL BLESSING OF THE POPE.”
CNA, citing sources close to the Vatican press office, said an investigation was underway to determine how the photo came to be liked.
A team of people manages the various social media accounts of the Pope.
A Vatican spokesperson told The Guardian: “We can exclude that the ‘like’ comes from the Holy See, and it has turned to Instagram for explanations.”
Pope Francis is very popular on social media, with his official Instagram account, which operates under the username franciscus, attracting 7.4 million followers. The account does not follow any other accounts.
On Twitter, the Pope is followed by 18.8 million accounts. In 2017, he was the most popular world leader on the social media platform.
But very rarely does he compose content for social media himself.
“The Pope is not like Donald Trump, he is not sitting around using his phone or computer to tweet all day,” said Robert Mickens, Rome-based editor of the English edition of the Catholic daily La Croix.
“He, for example, approves of tweets, but doesn’t like them, and on very rare occasions he has said that he would like to tweet something due to a developing situation or an emergency. So he would have nothing to do with this, it’s the communications department, and how this happens … who knows. “
