ACT leader David Seymour says he hasn't bought social media followers and is investigating after his Instagram followers jumped by 48,000 in one day.
Data from social media monitoring platform Crowdtangle shows Seymour's followers increased from 23,800 on Wednesday to 72,600 on Thursday.
The jump was noticed on Twitter with several people questioning what caused it and whether the MP had bought followers.
"David Seymour's Instagram follower count has increased by over 20 thousand followers in one day. What's going on here?" one person asked.
Others pointed out the MP was gaining thousands of followers in minutes.
Many of the new followers looked suspiciously like fake accounts with random numbers and underscores in their names.
But Seymour poured cold water on the suggestions on Thursday tweeting: "We would never buy followers. My team has asked @Meta for an explanation."
Before Thursday's jump, Seymour's Instagram followers were fairly steady on 23,800. Social media users have suggested perhaps someone else bought the followers as a political ploy, however there is no evidence of that so far.
Other users suggested it was just down to the platform's changeable algorithms or simply Seymour gaining political popularity.
ACT has been gaining momentum over the past few years but the latest 1News Kantar Public Poll showed the party down 3 points to 8 percent.
Seymour has 26,900 followers on Twitter and 73,000 on Facebook.
