Pakistan says no space for Blue Whale, Momo challenge

• IT minister says govt to declare developing, sharing and using suicidal software a cyber-crime

KARACHI: Federal Minister for Information Technology Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui on Sunday placed a ban on video games like the Blue Whale and Momo challenge throughout the country.

During a meeting with the joint delegation of IT and software developers here, he said that these games don’t have any place in Pakistan as they were destroying the youth and were one of the key players in suicides taking place worldwide.

He said that a law would be passed in this regard where developing, sharing and using such software would be a crime under the Cyber Crime Act. Late last year, a parliamentary panel directed the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to launch a media campaign to create awareness on the perils of a suicide game that has claimed several lives around the world.

The directives came after media reported that a section of youth in Pakistan have been participating in the ‘Blue Whale’ challenge, wherein an administrator gives a player a task to complete every day for a period of 50 days. In the final task, the player is compelled to kill themselves. The players are expected to share photos of the challenges/tasks completed by them.