In a very brief burst of popularity, the app that allowed anyone to view the Instagram feeds of any public user has had its access to the Instagram API removed. In only 8 days since its launch, Being had already accumulated 400,000 users, with 11,000 people downloading the app during the last day that it was available. The app had even managed to be placed on the featured page of their App Store, which may have been the downfall of the app. Whether the app’s loss of access to the Instagram API was intentional on the part of either the app developer or Instagram themselves is yet to be confirmed.
The purpose of Being was to enable people to see Instagram as another person would, be it friends, family or even celebrities. Being functioned by collecting information on who the person you were to become followed and using this to reconstruct their feed on the app like they were viewing Instagram themselves. This allowed users almost a window into the lives of any other users, able to see all of the feeds they follow, from entire lists of friends to their interests.
While nothing that Being does is illegal, it is easy to see why the app may have been shut down, as while all of this information could likely be collected manually by one dedicated enough, it could be seen as infringing their privacy, even though all of the data was public. If Instagram willingly pulled the plug on the app, they are yet to release a comment.
