First daughter Malia Obama has allegedly been the target of malicious social media attacks on Instagram. The web trolls have been identified as Iranian locals, but it's still unclear why this mob has been filling her official page with hateful comments.
The Al-Monitor reports that Malia Obama's Instagram account was temporarily switched to private after Iranian netizens filled the comments section with insults. Going through the social media account, which has since been restored, there have indeed been posts made in a particular photo where the First Daughter appears to be wearing a hijab.
The messages were written in Persian script, as well broken English. It also looked like the Iranians were directing their comments against their fellowmen. While non-Iranian native speakers and readers might not have any clue about what's being exchanged in the post, one commenter stated that the account should be made private.
Some Iranian web users were reported to have reached out to Malia Obama via the social media site's direct message feature to express their regrets over the fuss in the comments. They apologized for the behavior of their fellow Iranians and screen caps about the conversations were posted on an Iranian site Enekhab.
The Al-Monitor further reports that Malia Obama supposedly replied to these direct messages. "I understand there are some good Iranians, so to those who've sent apologies I accept them," the First Daughter supposedly wrote back.
Malia Obama's Instagram account is managed by the White House, which means that monitoring and posting of some of the messages are done by a staff, similar to her parents' accounts. The messages that Malia posts herself are supposedly signed "-o.m."
Malia Obama, 18, is currently enjoying her gap year after graduating high school in May. New York Times reports that the younger Obama plans to attend Harvard in 2017's fall school year.
