Youtube ‘is not vetting videos on its Kids app’

Channel attacked after online star filmed corpse in forest and racked up 6m hits from young viewers

YOUTUBE is allowing children to view videos of suicides because it is not vetting its content, a Bafta-nominated BBC presenter has claimed.

Ed Petrie, who has spent 10 years working in children’s television, has called for the online video channel to be regulated. He spoke out after Logan Paul, the Youtube star, was forced to apologise for footage he posted online of an apparently dead body.

The 22-year-old was criticised after posting a visit to Aokigahara forest in Japan, the site of frequent youth suicides, under the title: “We found a dead body in the Japanese Suicide Forest…”

Paul, who has more than 15million subscribers on Youtube, later deleted the video and apologised for being “misguided by shock and awe”. However, before it was taken down the post had been viewed more than six million times on the children’s app. Paul is said to earn around £1 million a month from posting his videos.

The Ohio-born actor who rose to fame posting prank videos, is filmed exploring the forest before stumbling across what appears to be a corpse. His video includes a number of close-ups of the body, with the face blurred out.

Several people urged Youtube to remove the “insensitive” and “disrespectful” video before Paul seemingly removed it himself. He later said: “I’m often reminded of how big of a reach I truly have and with great power comes great responsibility… for the first time in my life I’m regretful to say that I handled that power incorrectly. It won’t happen again.”

Petrie criticised Youtube yesterday, writing on Twitter: “There needs to be some serious questions asked about how Youtube functions.”

Youtube promotes its children’s app stating: “We created Youtube Kids to make it safer and simpler for kids to explore the world through online video.”

Petrie added: “On their Youtube Kids app they should vet every video before it’s posted, instead of taking things down after they get complaints.”

Meanwhile, an interactive Snapchat advert of a drunken pirate has been banned by the Advertising Standards Authority for breaching alcohol rules.

The Captain Morgan promotion on Snapchat, a social media site popular with teenagers, overlays a cartoon of a pirate on selfies so the user’s face looks like the buccaneer. A seagull flies across the screen with a scroll which read: “Live like the Captain”. Two clinking glasses also feature. Although the cartoon did not use bright colours, it did age and add a beard to the user’s face, which the ASA considered was for “comedic effect”.

It said: “Taken together with the lens icon, we considered that the interactive and augmented elements of the lens, such as the user’s face being made to look like a buccaneer, the clinking glasses, references to ‘Captain’ and the cheering, were likely to appeal particularly to those under 18.”

This breaches advertising rules which say marketing communications for alcohol cannot be directed at this age group, the ASA added.