The word ‘Blue Whale’ has intrigued me for a long time.
I remember the first quiz book I ever bought. It was in 2005 and was a quiz book called ‘1001 Questions and Answers’
While skimming through, I was baffled with an answer to a question. The vague question was, ‘Which is the largest Mammal in the world?’
‘Elephant’ screamed I with happiness, thinking I got it right. But, the answer made me wonder. It was Blue Whale!
And I thought how can a Blue Whale become a mammal. I thought all fishes were Oviparous.
This certainly intrigued me and I began reading about Blue Whale whenever I found an article about it. While some fake WhatsApp forwards did intrigue me, the enormous size of Whale made me a mathematician. Whenever I came across a barren land, I would think if Blue Whale could fit here.
The advent of Internet in my household helped me see footages of Blue Whale when I came across a concept called Whaling!
(Pic Source: Wikipedia)
Whaling was one of the forms of fishing where a large number of ships shoot arrows at a whale to capture them. Because of its enormous size, it was difficult for one ship to finish this task and of course, a mighty whale can easily destroy a ship. There have been people who went hunting for the whale and returned with their face covered in a veil! (I will come to this later)
Undeterred, people have gone back and finished the task.
And thanks to all of them, our bodies emit a pleasant serene because of such captures. ‘Amber’ which is one of the essential ingredients in the production of perfumes are extracted from ‘Whale oils’.
Soon the term ‘Whaling’ entered the internet space. It is used to denote hacking done on a large scale. This is hacking of multiple bank accounts, millions of passwords etc..
The reason? Because it’s a huge task to conquer and cannot be done by a single person, but by a group of hackers.
So many trivia’s and information from just one topic: The Blue Whale.
But, today a simple google search on the term doesn’t throw result relating to the animal.
Wikipedia, what about Blue Whale (Animal)? Didn’t it exist for thousands of years?
Now, the problem is simple.
Assuming that another kid is stupefied of the fact that Blue whale is a mammal and search for the term in Google, what does he get to read?
The Game!
And as kids what do we do? Download!
Talk about it!
Ask friends for the game!
Play the game!
Go hunting for the whale and return with a face covered in a veil! Because this time we hung ourselves. The Whale isn’t responsible. Our curiosity is.
Who is to be blamed is of course debatable.
Is it the newspapers who keep talking about the ‘game’ or is it the children who play even after reading about its risk!
But, I strongly feel the news shouldn’t be prevalent across the internet. Because the curious minds are a click away from searching for the game and playing it.
The media must stop reporting the name of the game, while Internet companies and Cyber crime branches must take efforts to suppress the game from spreading over the Internet.
I’ve seen people discussing that the game only kills those who are ‘faint-hearted’. It only kills teens etc.. And worse, I saw someone today playing the game!
I was at a tour company in Chennai enquiring about my vacation. While the formalities were being done, there was a man jabbing at his phone. People who spoke with him, mocked him.
They were telling him things like ‘Don’t scare me at night’, ‘We’re soon going to have a memorial day’ etc..
I was curious as to why such statements were being mentioned when he threw his earphones and said ‘I don’t know how to play this’
He turned the mobile to the agent with whom I was speaking to and found a blue whale on his screen. I was appalled!
But I figured out that this ‘Blue Whale’ game isn’t the original game. It was a boring Blue Whale 3D game.
My dad who sat beside me told him not to take such risks. Who can predict what might happen next? After all, people aged over 20 have been victims of this game. I chipped in too, saying that it’s dangerous and that I’ve been reading a lot about it over the recent past.
One more agent joined our conversation and said ‘I uninstalled it!’
Was I hearing that right?
Apparently, it was!
Seems like he was given a few ‘strange’ tasks by the administrator. As soon as the tasks were found dangerous, he decided to uninstall the game.
Quoting him, ‘I decided to uninstall it after the tasks grew dangerous. I felt the tasks were harmful and uninstalled the game. I read about the game online and it seems the administrator would inflict harm on my friends/family. I’m scared to death about it! Hope it’s all fake. I’m too scared to venture out anywhere’.
And he was about 35 years old! Now I wonder if it’s only dangerous for the ‘faint-hearted’!
Why taste the forbidden fruit? Better to stay away from it.
Do not encourage anyone who wants to play the game. The casualties are growing in tenfold every passing day. This is madness.
If you find your friends or family members queer, start questioning them. It can be stopped! There are exits to all entry-gates. It is not a trap! But, don’t try eating the cheese knowing it’s a trap. The cheese is poisonous, it’s deadly!
My request to all the media agencies. Conceal the name of such strange games. It only invokes curiosity.
Let’s stop discovering the ‘Blue Whale (Game)’ and start securing the endangered ‘Blue Whale’.
#RandomThoughts 