Vulva Anatomy Educational Video

Summary decisions examine cases in which Meta has reversed its original decision on a piece of content after the Board brought it to the company’s attention and include information about Meta’s acknowledged errors. They are approved by a Board Member panel, rather than the full Board, do not involve public comments and do not have precedential value for the Board. Summary decisions directly bring about changes to Meta’s decisions, providing transparency on these corrections, while identifying where Meta could improve its enforcement.

Summary

A user appealed Meta’s decision to remove her educational post on Instagram about the anatomy of the vulva. After the Board brought the appeal to Meta’s attention, the company reversed its original decision and restored the post with a “Mark as Sensitive” warning screen.

About the Case

In April 2026, an Instagram user posted a video describing the anatomy of the vulva and their functions. It contains drawings of the body part annotated with terminology. It also addresses certain misconceptions, including the belief that females have only two openings and the notion that using menstrual cups or tampons results in loss of virginity or vaginal looseness. The caption above the video asks users to follow the account for more content.

The user who appealed Meta’s removal decision to the Board argued that the video’s visuals were “simplified, non-realistic, and designed to aid understanding of anatomy and correct usage of menstrual products,” and that the content was intended for “solely educational and awareness purposes.”

Under Meta’s Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity Community Standard, the company restricts “the display of nudity or sexual activity because some people in [Meta’s community] may be sensitive to this type of content, particularly due to cultural background or age.” This policy applies to “real photographs and videos of nudity and sexual activity, AI- or computer-generated images of nudity and sexual activity, and digital imagery, regardless of whether it looks ‘photorealistic.’” Adult nudity depicting “visible genitalia (including when obscured by pubic hair or digital overlays)” is prohibited.

The policy also explains, however, “that nudity can be shared for a variety of reasons, including [...] to raise awareness about a cause or for educational or medical reasons. Where appropriate and such intent is clear, [Meta] make[s] allowances for the content.” For digital imagery depicting “visible genitalia (including genitalia covered by digital overlay or obscurement and genitalia obscured by pubic hair), close-ups of visible buttocks, or visible anuses, when shared in a medical or health context,” Meta includes a label so people are aware the content is sensitive.

Meta initially removed the content under the Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity policy. After the Board brought this case to Meta’s attention, the company determined that the content did not violate the policy and that its original decision to remove the post was incorrect. Meta considered that the content depicts visible genitalia shared in a health context but “due to the sensitivity of the subject matter, the content will be restored with a MAS [“Mark as Sensitive”] warning screen.”

Board Authority and Scope

The Board has authority to review Meta’s decision following an appeal from the user whose content was removed (Charter Article 2, Section 1; Bylaws Article 3, Section 1).

When Meta acknowledges it made an error and reverses its decision in a case under consideration for Board review, the Board may select that case for a summary decision (Bylaws Article 2, Section 2.1.3). The Board reviews the original decision to increase understanding of the content moderation process, reduce errors and increase fairness for Facebook, Instagram and Threads users.

Significance of Case

This case demonstrates that, despite Meta’s efforts to further improve accuracy in the enforcement of its exceptions to the Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity Community Standard, errors continue to hinder users’ ability to raise awareness and educate the public about health issues and body anatomy. In one of its earliest decisions, the Breast Cancer Symptoms and Nudity decision, the Board emphasized that the removal of such content impacts not only users’ freedom of expression but also their right to health, given that access to health-related information is an important part of the right to health. The impact of similar errors was also addressed in the Board’s Breast Cancer Awareness Content, Education Posts About Ovulation, Breast Self-Exam and Testicular Cancer Self-Check Infographics summary decisions.

The Board has issued recommendations aimed at reducing Meta's enforcement errors specifically concerning exceptions to its Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity Community Standard. For example, the Board recommended that Meta “improve the automated detection of images with text-overlay to ensure that posts raising awareness of breast cancer symptoms are not wrongly flagged for review” ( Breast Cancer Symptoms and Nudity, recommendation no. 1). The Board considers this recommendation implemented as demonstrated through published information. Meta reported enhancements to text-overlay and the development of a new health content classifier with better capabilities to identify breast cancer context, in place since July 2021. To show the impact of the recommendation, Meta reported that its implementation has contributed to an additional 1,000 pieces of content being sent for human review that would have previously been removed between March 21 and April 18, 2023, alone. Even with the improvements reported by Meta, enforcement errors may still occur in at-scale content moderation. The Board would also apply the underlying principle behind this recommendation to content raising awareness on health-related topics more broadly, such as the post in this case. In determining awareness-raising intent, automated tools should consider not only images but also, as with this piece of content, overlay text, caption and audio. The Board encourages Meta to continue to improve its ability to accurately enforce its policies based on a range of signals.

One pathway toward enforcement improvement would be through audit procedures. The Board has also recommended that Meta “implement an internal audit procedure to continuously analyze a statistically representative sample of automated content removal decisions to reverse and learn from enforcement mistakes” ( Breast Cancer Symptoms and Nudity, recommendation no. 5). The Board considers that Meta did not address this recommendation, given that the company bundled it with recommendation no. 1, mentioned above, without engaging with the internal audit procedure outlined by the Board. The Board believes that data generated by internal audits like the one described above could be used to improve the company’s content moderation systems. It would therefore be important for Meta to reconsider this recommendation in light of upcoming changes to these systems, with the deployment of more advanced AI tools, as announced by the company earlier this year.

The Board encourages Meta to continue to improve its ability to accurately detect content that falls within exceptions to the Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity policy. While Meta’s commitment to the aforementioned recommendation no. 1 has reportedly been preventing enforcement errors, a commitment to recommendation no. 5 is necessary in light of the multiple enforcement errors the Board identified in this and other cases, referred to above. Implementing these recommendations would further strengthen the company’s ability to reduce errors.

Decision

The Board overturns Meta’s original decisions to remove the post. The Board acknowledges Meta’s correction of its initial error once the Board brought the cases to Meta’s attention.

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