Google and Apple reject female nudity app designed to bypass Instagram rules

An app designed to help women post nude photos on Instagram has recently been rejected by both Apple's App Store, and the Google Play Store.

The app, named 'Nood,' was designed by model Melina DiMarco. Nood provides a sticker set of animated lady parts, which can then be used to place over real private parts for images to be posted on Instagram. The photo-centric social networking service has recently been seen cracking down on "violent, nude, partially nude... pornographic or sexually suggestive photos," implying that men can post topless photos, but women are prohibited to do so.

"As a woman and as a model I don't quite understand why my male counterpart can post freely on social media but I cannot," DiMarco stated. Eventually, Nood became her way to attempt to find a way around Instagram's rules.

However, she still seems to not be content on how the app currently works, seeing it as "not enough." "I get very frustrated when I see Xs and bars and cutesy stickers on the female body," she says. "To me that promotes the over sexualisation of the female form."

In its defense, Apple explains that Nood "includes content that many users would find objectionable and offensive," while Google "does not allow apps that contain or promote sexually explicit content."

DiMarco finds these explanations to be "extremely hypocritical." She concludes:

"When you take a look at what's in both stores, many [other apps] are over-sexualising women. If you're going to allow those things in the app store then minimally illustrated lady parts should be in there too. Women deserve to represent their bodies on their own terms and they deserve to show their nipples just like any man does. By denying this app they're denying women the right to represent their bodies in a positive way."

Instagram currently prohibits posting of nudity on the platform, which includes photos, videos, and some "digitally-created content that show sexual intercourse, genitals, and close-ups of fully-nude buttocks." It only allows photos of post-mastectomy scarring, women actively breastfeeding, and nudity in forms of paintings and sculptures.

Source: BBC Newsbeat