Vatican Probes into Pope Francis’ Instagram Liking Model’s Photo

Toyota Mirai Papamobile
VATICAN CITY, VATICAN - OCTOBER 07: Pope Francis attends the delivery of the Toyota Mirai Papamobile on October 07, 2020 in Vatican City, Vatican. Photo by Franco Origlia/Getty Images for Toyota

The liked photo of a model in a schoolgirl outfit by the Instagram account of Pope Francis prompted the Vatican to conduct an investigation as it circulated online.

The spokesperson for the Vatican shared on Friday that they are currently reaching the popular social media app to find some answers, NBC reported.

Director of the Vatican Press Office, Matteo Bruni stated that they are now studying what really happened with the aid of the competent office at Instagram.

According to the Vatican, there is a team running the social media accounts of the Pope but they believe that the like came from an outside source.

The said liked photo was posted on October 6 on the Instagram account of Natalia Garibotto, who is a lingerie model, wherein she can be seen wearing high stockings, suspenders, and a revealing school girl-inspired outfit.

Based on a report, the date as to when the official account of Pope followed the model's account, but the like notice by the public on November 13 but being unliked the next day, South China Morning Post reported.

The management company of Garibotto, the COY Co., grabbed the opportunity to promote the model on social media while she is currently in the spotlight online.

After an embarrassing social media mishap wherein the account of the Pope liked the bikini model's racy picture, the Vatican is now demanding answers from the social media app.

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Despite the incident causing hilarity online, the Vatican felt it the other way as they are mentioning that they are still waiting for answers from the Facebook-owned platform, aside from the investigation at the Holy See, Reuters reported.

The Vatican spokesperson also shared that the name of the Pope shall not be linked to the liked photo as Instagram should be the one to explain the said incident.

The lingerie model, Garibotto tweeted after discovering what had happened that at least she is going to heaven.

She also linked it on her website and made a persuading caption that if Pope Francis wanted the site, so others should also.

The management company of the model, Coy Co, also took advantage of the current scenario and made a declaration that the lingerie model had already received the official blessing of the Pope.

They also joked that the legend has it, and stated that Pope Francis is subscribed on the model's website just using a pseudonym.

The papal social media is managed by a team that is composed of Vatican employees and the account of Pope Francis does not follow anybody on Instagram.

Sources from the Vatican also confirmed that there is an ongoing investigation being conducted and underway in order to determine what really happened on the Pope's Instagram account.

The apparent mistake was rescinded on November 14 after the Vatican was alerted to the online mishap.

The liked image showed the lingerie model dressed in a short tartan skirt while she packed the books into a locker.

Garibotto, who is currently 27 years of age has close to 2.5 million followers on the website and also made her presence felt on Twitch, which is an Amazon-owned streaming website.

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