Bluesky — Policy Change

moderatePro-PrivacyDec 16, 2025 → Jan 29, 2026Policy Change

Executive Summary

Bluesky published its inaugural comprehensive transparency report for 2025, covering moderation, legal demands, influence operations, and age assurance. The platform grew 60% to 41.41 million users, processed 9.97 million moderation reports (up 54% year-over- year), removed 2.44 million violating items including 2.08 million accounts, and applied 16.49 million content labels. Law- enforcement requests rose fivefold to 1,470.

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What Happened

On January 29, 2026, Bluesky published its first comprehensive transparency report covering 2025 operations. The platform grew nearly 60% to 41.41 million users and processed 9.97 million moderation reports, representing a 54% increase from 2024. The company removed 2.44 million violating items including 2.08 million accounts, applied 16.49 million content labels, and received 1,470 legal requests from law enforcement and government agencies, a fivefold increase from 238 requests in 2024.

Who Is Affected

All 41.41 million Bluesky users are affected by the platform's moderation policies and practices detailed in the report. The 1.24 million users who submitted reports in 2025, representing about 3% of the user base, were directly engaged with the moderation system. Users subject to the 1,470 legal requests from law enforcement and government agencies experienced potential data disclosures.

Why It Matters

This inaugural comprehensive transparency report establishes a public accountability baseline for Bluesky's handling of user data, content moderation, and government requests as the platform scales rapidly. The fivefold increase in legal requests signals growing government interest in user data as the platform expands. The report covers critical privacy areas including age assurance compliance, influence operations monitoring, and the handling of sensitive content categories including child safety.

What You Should Do

Review Bluesky's published transparency report to understand how the platform handles moderation reports, legal requests, and content removal. Adjust your privacy settings and content preferences based on the documented moderation practices and labeling systems. If you operate your own Personal Data Server as part of the federated network, ensure you understand how these policies may interact with your infrastructure.

AI-Assisted

Event summaries are generated by Claude AI from verified sources and reviewed by humans before publication.

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