Youtube’s loophole keeps sick drug vids on internet KIDS WATCH UK FILMS OF
POLITICIANS AND PARENTS DEMAND
CHILDREN as young as 12 are watching video tutorials on Youtube showing them how to take deadly class A drugs.
In the latest horrifying web trend, drug users are filming so-called “trip reports” which show them openly getting high on illegal substances.
The shock films on the social media site have been viewed millions of times, with youngsters born as recently as 2006 commenting on them.
Our investigators found videos posted by British Youtubers, or vloggers, taking deadly heroin, LSD and ecstasy and posting detailed user guides.
But when we informed Youtube, the company refused to remove the dangerous clips – and defended their decision because of a bizarre loophole.
They said of their policy: “We make exceptions for material with sufficient educational, documentary, news, scientific or artistic value.”
MPS, drug charities and families of child drug death victims last night united to urge the company – worth more than £30billion – to regulate its highly perilous illegal content.
Risk
Kayleigh Rundle, whose 15-year-old sister Shakira Pellow died last week after taking ecstasy, said: “It is unbelievable that a company like Youtube would allow videos like this knowing that millions of children use it every day. “The Youtubers are committing a crime in plain sight and getting away with it, while putting children at risk by making them think that taking drugs is safe. “There needs to be more pressure from the Government on websites like this and Youtubers should be punished for what they are doing.” We found a series of videos showing users posing with ecstasy on their tongues and inserting needles into their bodies. Some detail terrifying trips on psychoactive drugs Salvia Divinorum, LSD, MDMA, Ecstasy and magic mushrooms. The users talk about dosages, where to get the drugs and the minuteby-minute effects they have on their bodies. Many have hundreds of thou- sands of views plus thousands of approving comments and likes.
In the comments on one video which shows a potentially disturbing LSD trip, a young girl writes: “Your videos are so cool. I don’t know why people are telling you to stop if you are happy do it.”
On another video, a viewer who gives their date of birth as 2006, writes: “No one teaches you this stuff at school.”
British Youtuber Drew Gilchrist is shown with an ecstasy tablet on his tongue while in another video he details taking LSD and collapsing because he couldn’t see his own legs.
His video titled “Insane MDMA trip first time ecstasy trip report” has had 265,000 views.
In it he brags of how he was given a bag of 13 pills for £10 and took four of them.
While the videos themselves don’t carry advertising, they are accompanied by banners promoting other videos. This drives viewers towards related videos that contribute to Youtube’s £9 billion a year advertising revenue.
Youtube – which is owned by internet giant Google – told our investigators it is policy to prohibit any content promoting dangerous illegal activities. The firm puts age restrictions on videos which fall into the so-called “educational” category but it consists only of a guidance notice.
This will be of little comfort to the families of victims like Shakira Pellow of Redruth, Cornwall, who died in her mother’s arms after taking ecstasy.
Her brave family released a photo of