Called ‘Blue Whale’, a smartphone-app that makes teenagers commit suicide, is now the subject of WhatsApp rumours in India and many countries across the world.
So, what is the ‘Blue Whale’ app?
According to a BBC report, the application has its origins in Russia where a number of teenage-suicides have been attributed to it. The users are asked to complete certain tasks within a 50-day period, at the end of which they are asked to kill themselves, which is the objective of the game.
The game is titled Blue Whale apparently as a reference to the way the largest mammal beaches and dies at the end. In February, Russia linked the deaths of 15-year-old Yulia Konstantinova and 16-year-old Veronika Volkova to the game.
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A Russian media outlet reportedly linked 130 deaths to the game, saying that the children were part of the same online community. The BBCsays that while the rates of suicide among Russian teens is high anyway, the game does exist and first originated on the Russian social networking space ‘Vkontakte’ where a specific set of hashtags reference the game.
The report mentions that game-references are finding their way to more mainstream social-networks like Facebook and Twitter. A 21-year-old had been arrested in Russia who claimed to be the administrator of such a ‘death-group’ on social-networks.
Schools across the world are now sending advisories to parents, warning them of the app and its consequences.
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Here is one such advisory:
