Penny Challenge: Amazon’s Alexa Tells 10-Year-Old Girl to do Deadly TikTok Challenge

• Amazon has updated its voice assistant, Alexa after it challenged a 10-year-old girl to do the dangerous TikTok “Penny Challenge”

• The suggestion was made by the software after the girl asked Alexa for a challenge to do

• The deadly challenge involves inserting a coin into the prongs of a half-inserted plug

Amazon has announced that its Alexa voice assistant has been updated after a parent reported a deadly challenge that it asked her daughter to do.The voice assistant software asked the 10-year-old to do the penny challenge which involves touching the prongs of a half-inserted charger with a coin after she asked for a challenge to do.

According to the concerned mother Kristin Livdahl, the smart speaker said:

“Plug in a phone charger about halfway into a wall outlet, then touch a penny to the exposed prongs,”

Livdahl disclosed that she and her daughter were trying out some physical challenges and turned to Alexa when they ran out of ideas.
The Echo speaker then suggested that they partake in the challenge which was reportedly found on the web.

The dangerous Penny challenge started circulating on social media platform TikTok about a year ago and has been met with heavy criticism.

Read also: Apple Offers $180,000 to Employees to Stop Facebook Defection

Fire officials have warned people not to partake in the challenge owing to risks of fire or even electrocution.
In a statement released to BBC, an Amazon spoke person said:

“Customer trust is at the center of everything we do and Alexa is designed to provide accurate, relevant, and helpful information to customers,” “As soon as we became aware of this error, we took swift action to fix it.”

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