Threads Users Discover You Can't Delete Account Without Also Deleting Instagram

Anyone who signed up for Meta's new social media platform Threads and found themselves not enamored with the reported waves of sponcon from brands and the SFW-Twitter-esque atmosphere of the app's opening days and decided they wanted out has been met with a surprising hitch: To delete a Threads account, one must also delete their Instagram.

The policy is in the terms of service, which undoubtedly very few of the 70 million people who signed up for the app in the days following its launch read thoroughly.

The news spread on Twitter thanks in large part to a tweet from a user by the name of EmilyHughes, who noted the policy and attempted to warn people about it, likely to little avail.

In this way, Threads is to Instagram what Messenger is to Facebook -- while technically separate apps used for different purposes, Meta has made it so that you can't have the former without the latter.

The discovery of the policy caused outrage among some users, who claimed it was a "scummy move" on Meta's part, essentially forcing the retention of users on its new app by linking it with its much more established app.

As annoyance and outrage spread throughout social media following the revelation, Instagram head Adam Mosseri provided some clarification about the policy.

He noted that, at the moment, one can deactivate their account, set it to private and delete individual threads if they are unhappy with the Threads app, but because Threads is essentially powered by Instagram, one can't delete the former without deleting the latter.

However, he also said Meta was "looking into" how they could make it so one could delete Threads without deleting Instagram in the future.