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The Momo challenge is essentially just an anonymous user hiding behind a weird picture, telling kids to kill themselves. The challenge is aimed at children aged 8-12, where they’re most susceptible to threats, ranging from ‘cut your hair’ to ‘kill yourself and your family’. She threatens to curse your family and will come in the night and will kill you while you’re sleeping. The challenge was created a year – two years ago, where it would just message people telling them to kill themselves. The challenge’s popularity died down, and people stopped caring about it. However, the people behind the Momo hacked the cartoon show Peppa Pig and put this song in the episodes.

Personally, I believe that the media is making a big deal out of nothing. While it is tragic that some children have carried out the tasks that Momo asks, it was a much bigger problem around a year ago, where it resulted in many lives lost. I don’t believe that it is worth worrying over right now, compared to last year. The only reason it’s gotten this much publicity all of a sudden is that it has now transferred to Youtube Kids, even though it has been on the main Youtube app, which is easily accessible by all, for over a year. An article by CNN says:

“So this has been around for a while. And the reason that it’s probably getting the kind of scrutiny and attention that it’s getting is because of its appearance in younger kids’ content,” she says. “And because of that, and because of the accessibility, coupled with the frustration for parents, I think it’s just a fever pitch of, ‘Here’s one more thing that YouTube is exposing kids to and not taking any accountability around.'”

Overall, I personally believe that, while it is a threat, it was a much bigger threat before, and the fact that there was virtually no news about it is messed up.

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