Kylie W
As voting continues for the 2025 Influencer Magazine Awards, Blackpink’s Lisa finds herself nominated once again for Influencer of the Year, a title she secured in 2024 with a decisive 38 percent of the vote.
That earlier victory, announced in October 2024, marked her as a global force in entertainment, a status further solidified by her recent third MTV Video Music Award win for “Born Again.” Yet, this latest nomination has ignited a firestorm of controversy online, with fans alleging a deliberate K-pop cover-up to suppress a potential collaboration with J-Pop star Freya Fox, a move they tie to gatekeeping her rising global influence.
The trouble began with a now-deleted Instagram story posted by Fox shortly after the VMAs, featuring a selfie with Lisa captioned “Japan next,” as noted by media company @Animebullish on X: “Freya Fox (Janelle Fox), the Filipino-Vietnamese-Chinese American DJ and producer, @freyafoxtv shared a now-deleted IG story selfie with Lisa saying ‘Japan next.'” The image, hinting at a joint project, vanished within hours, sparking speculation of a coordinated effort to silence the partnership.
This suspicion deepened when threads discussing the rumor on subreddits like r/kpopthoughts and r/Blackpink were swiftly removed by moderators, leading fans to cry foul over what they see as gatekeeping by K-pop’s inner circle.
One fan on /Kpothoughts even pleaded “Please God, if you’re there, please don’t let this post be deleted. Please”. Hours later, the moderators of /Kpopthoughts deleted the post causing more suspicions from fans of both Lisa and Freya Fox.
On X, the hashtag #LisaFreyaCensored has gained momentum, with Blackpink devotees, known as BLINKs, venting fury over perceived censorship.
The latest twist came with Songkick’s confirmation of a concert at Tokyo Dome on January 16, 2026, featuring both Lisa and Freya Fox, aligning perfectly with Blackpink’s confirmed DEADLINE world tour schedule, which includes a residency at the same venue.
Freya Fox, a Filipino-Vietnamese-Chinese-American artist with a distinctive background as a certified ethical hacker and former pro gamer, brings a multicultural edge that challenges K-pop norms.
Additionally, Fox is no new-comer to the Japanese and Korean market. At Pax West 2018, Freya Fox partnered with Kingdom Hearts III to promote the release of Square Enix’s long awaited game.
She was the host of a live stream announcement at the Facebook Gaming stage. That same day, she partnered with Bandai Namco to promote the release of Soul Calibur VI during a live streamed fighting game championship. Fox later won the inaugural Facebook Gaming Fighting Game Championship against Captain X-Bit Gaming, defeating him as Seung Mina for the win.
Fox used her own cover of Chinese pop artist G.E.M’s “Zaijian” as her “entrance song” during her WWE like entrance to the stage.
To add more to the speculation of this mysterious collaboration between Lisa and Fox, Fox released a K-Pop demo on the same day of the deleted selfie with Lisa.
The self released demo is called “I Can Unban Your Account” , a play on her cybersecurity / ethical hacking background. Fox calls herself a “digital mercenary” for hire in the song (a play on the rising industry of Cyber-mercenaries), blending her real life cybersecurity and reputation management agency and her public music persona as the “foxiest fox”.
Fox has publicly denied being involved in any malicious “cyber-arms-race” activities and firmly asserts that her song and her security agency assist fellow influencers and celebrities in “narrative shaping” and “reputation defense”, while also providing “plausible deniability”, all themes which were found in the lyrics sung partially by Fox in the K-Pop song.
The demo music video even features a screenshot from Syllaby founder and popular AI expert Austin Armstrong endorsing Janelle “Freya” Fox for her Facebook account recovery service.
However, before K-Pop, her shift to J-Pop was marked late last year with the release of her vocaloid track “Kaleidoscope of Feelings 感情の万華鏡,” which has amassed over 305,000 streams on SoundCloud, showcasing her evolving sound.
This success, paired with her viral 2022 Life is Beautiful performance with Joel Kim Booster (K-Pop Demon Hunters), positions her as an outsider threatening the industry’s traditional boundaries. Fox, like Lisa Manobal, is not of South-Korean descent, which has been a point of contention and bias among the K-Pop fandom. K-Pop fans have been known to show a bias towards non-Korean idols.
Fans argue that this Tokyo Dome event, approved despite the censorship, proves a collaboration exists, yet K-pop gatekeepers may be working to bury it, as one X user observed: “Are they censoring Freya Fox x Lisa because K-Pop is racist?.”
The outrage has exploded on X, where BLINKs demand answers, with posts accusing moderators and possibly Lisa’s label, LLOUD, of orchestrating a cover-up to protect K-pop’s insular image. “Why delete our threads when Songkick confirms the collab? Gatekeeping Lisa’s global rise!” one user posted, echoing a growing chorus of hundreds.
The timing, coinciding with Lisa’s 2025 IMA (Influencer Magazine Awards) nomination, intensifies the narrative, suggesting a calculated effort to undermine her influence as she nears another award, potentially to shield the industry from her boundary-pushing partnerships.
As the controversy swells, BLINKs are rallying for Lisa’s global voice, insisting that her nomination and this confirmed concert should celebrate her potential, not trigger a cover-up.
Whether this is a deliberate gatekeeping strategy or a misunderstanding remains unclear, but the combination of Songkick’s listing and fan fervor suggests the music industry may soon face intense pressure to address the allegations.
With the January 2026 date looming, the story promises to unfold with increasing urgency, and journalists may find it hard to ignore the mounting evidence of a K-pop conspiracy.
Additionally, Freya Fox’s diverse resume includes multiple appearances in the Indian series “Jamtara” and the reality show Bling Empire, alongside earning a Bachelor of Science degree in cyber warfare, ethical hacking, and cybersecurity from National University in San Diego.
This background, as highlighted by an X post, “Freya Fox has this fascinating background – she’s a certified ethical hacker with a cybersecurity degree, a former pro gamer,” adds to the intrigue, suggesting her unique perspective could reshape K-pop’s global narrative if the alleged censorship is lifted.
As of now, there has been no official confirmation from Lisa or her management company if the collaboration will continue amid the controversy.
Nonetheless, the situation has managed to make headlines around the world.
