Momo hoax: schools, police and media told to stop promoting viral challenge

Children's charities say warnings about online suicide challenge have done more harm than good

Britain's media, schools and police forces were told on Thursday to stop promoting an online hoax about the so-called Momo challenge, amid fears that unjustified warnings about the supposed phenomenon risked doing more harm than good.

The Momo challenge centres on false claims that a mysterious character is using WhatsApp messages to encourage children to kill themselves. After it moved from the fringes of the internet to the mass media, interventions from authority figures were blamed for creating a full-blown moral panic - and genuine fear among children.