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Update (Jan. 31, 2016) It looks like all stolen photos have been removed!! Hurray! I contacted Eco Cloth Diaper about this issue, and was told that the person or people behind these accounts are “affiliates” of Eco Cloth Diaper, thus earning a commission when people click through on the link posted on their Instagram accounts. I am happy to see the stolen photos taken down, but would not personally shop via those links or via Eco Cloth Diaper based on this incident, which really left a bad taste in my mouth!

A big shout out to a couple of Funky Fluff Ambassadors, who spotted this odd and irritating Instagram phenomenon:

A diaper reseller, Eco Cloth Diaper, is stealing cloth diaper photos from diaper makers and parents and posting them as their own.

Why? Well, in the hopes of gaining followers, of course! Cloth diapering parents love to follow the accounts of cloth diapering friends, not to mention brands and shops. Posting these pictures tricks people into following the accounts associated with Eco Cloth Diaper.

This is different than re-posting. This is not the same thing as, for example, Funky Fluff re-posting a picture of a baby wearing Funky Fluff. (By the way, I do this for Funky Fluff, but I always ask permission first, and credit the original poster.)

The culprits:

A full list of profiles is being compiled on Instagram on this post. Add any you find there and I’ll update here as I can!

@AbigailMortlock and @ErinCMclean: (these were the first two brought to my attention, since then we have discovered many, many more)

Update: Add @EllaRichards86 to the list and ClothDiaperingBasics.com

Update: @JuliaEPowell and DiaperCoverPattern.com

Update: @AliceRGriffin and ClothDiapersWithInserts.com Update: @SiennaGWebb

@EmilyMcGuigan and ClothDiapersForBabies.com

@RuthWFranklin and AdjustableClothDiapers.com @NiamHButler87 and ClothDiapersInBulk.com

@SherryXiao89 seems to be the ring leader (owner?) of this whole operation, but her account only features pictures of the diapers she sells. I would still be blocking her!

Update: Since they seem to be orchestrating this whole scheme, I would also block @ecoclothdiaper

What’s wrong with all these (and more) accounts?

Ok so off the bat, you see their more recent pics are just Alva-style diapers. But earlier in their feeds, you see: (I blocked out the pics where you can identify the child.) Abigail and Erin’s (definitely their real names) profiles both link to CheapClothDiaper.com (don’t worry, it’s a no-follow link so it won’t give them any search engine clout if you click it). [ClothDiaperingBasics leads to the same site, as do all the other bizarre URLs in the profiles shown above.] Oh look! Kids wearing TotsBots Bamboozles! Seems so legit. This site then leads you to EcoClothDiaper.com, a pretty standard direct-from-China diaper site:

So what? So, the false advertising is definitely annoying. To the casual viewer, it may appear that Eco Cloth Diaper and Cheap Cloth Diaper sell beautiful, custom-made embroidery diapers and big names like GroVia, AppleCheeks and Funky Fluff. But honestly, if you take a look at their feed, you figure out the scam pretty quickly.

Luckily, neither account has many followers. The thing is, lots of IG users simply follow back those who follow them. These two accounts probably attempt to gain fans by following people who post about cloth diapers. Their names are totally innocuous, and anyone looking at their feeds prior to all the Alva pics would’ve assumed they were just cloth diapering shops or moms.

What can we do? I’m sure the vast majority of us are not under the illusion that social media is private. No surprise there. It’s just annoying for someone to take what doesn’t belong to them, particularly when the intent is clearly very shady.

They don’t seem to care about taking watermarked pictures, though at least a watermark allows people to know where an image originally came from. (They also post WAHM diapers with very visible tags.)

According to Instagram’s terms of service, “You represent and warrant that: (i) you own the Content posted by you on or through the Service or otherwise have the right to grant the rights and licenses set forth in these Terms of Use.” Clearly these Instagram users aren’t respecting the terms of service, but IG likely has bigger fish to fry.

People have been commenting on the stolen pictures, and even those comments haven’t been erased by “Abigail” and “Erin.” We can at least take comfort in the fact that they kind of suck at their scheme:

Their photos aren’t hash tagged, so it’s unlikely people will stumble upon them;

Some of their photos make no sense:

My beef is that unsuspecting parents are having their cute pics taken and re-posted without their permission, and that’s just annoying as f*ck.

Personally, I’m going to go back to watermarking all my pictures on IG (I’ve gotten lazy), and hopefully if you know any of the few followers these accounts have, you can warn them to unfollow.

If your photo is being used without your permission, report them!

The best action I can recommend for all of us at this point is to caution all the cloth diapering parents you know about shopping at Eco Cloth Diapers and for all of us to block related profiles! (Click the three dots at the top right when viewing the profile.)

We can also start bombarding sales@ecoclothdiaper.com with emails… Maybe they’ll get the message? Make sure you aren’t a fan of their Facebook page, too: https://www.facebook.com/EcoClothDiaper/

(Update) I messaged the Eco Cloth Diaper Page about the issue and got the following response: If you’ve spotted other profiles like this, let me know so I can update the list!