Blue Whale Challenge
Blue Whale Challenge
First noticed in mid-2016, Blue Whale Challenge is a global online game responsible for a number of suicides. The game was a center of news across the world and had existed in several countries. The reports states, the challenge comprised of a set of tasks that were to be completed by the player over a 50-day period. In the social network phenomenon, each day, the players were allotted with one task.
| Name | Blue Whale Challenge |
| Other names | Blue Whale Game |
| Origin | 2016 |
| Country / Location | not known (please suggest in comments below) |
| Known for | suicidal game |
Facts about Blue Whale Challenge
- The game had a harmless task initially such as watching a horror movie in the middle of the night. However, with every next task, it became deleterious to participating in introducing elements of self-harm. In the final task, the player required to commit suicide.
- The administrators of the challenge targeted only teenage kids ranging between 12 and 14, sighting them the most vulnerable.
- The story of the challenge commenced with a teenage girl Rina Palenkova. She posted a selfie on 22 November 2015, with the caption ‘bye-bye’, a day before taking her own life.
- The derivation of the name “Blue Whale” is indecisive. There are many beliefs of the origin, one being a song by band Lumen titled ‘I was screaming inside but no one could hear me’. Others say it is the orientation to whales when they become stranded on the beach and loses their life.
- There are no particular social media platforms used by the administrators of the game to target their participants.
- It is said that someone cannot approach the game as the player is exclusively chosen by them.
- It is believed by many experts, that the challenge was originally a sensationalized hoax. According to them, the social network taking has led to occurrences of copied self-harming and impersonator groups.
- A 21-year-old named Philipp Budeikin made a claim that the game was created by him in 2013. He was a psychology student who was expelled from his university. According to him, his purpose was to clean out the weak and no-valued people from society, to make it better. In May 2016, he admitted to “provoking at least 16 teenage girls to commit suicide”. He was found guilty on two counts of provoking suicide of a minor.
- A postman named Ilya Sidorov was also accused of forming a Blue Whale group. He was arrested in Moscow in June 2017. His charges included inciting children to self-harm and eventually kill themselves. His claims have suggested that he has convinced 32 children to join his group and follow commands.
- Another arrest regarding the case was made in June 2018 by Nikita Nearonov. The Russian financial analyst was taken into custody for supposedly masterminding the Blue Whale game. He is alleged to groom 10 “underage” girls in order to provoke them to suicide. It is believed that 2 of the 10 girls, aged 14 and 17, have survived.
