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Your Kids’ Spotify Might Be Playing Sexually Explicit Audio

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Hello,

Explicit sexual audio content on Spotify India is easily accessible to children, often appearing even during seemingly innocent searches such as “bedtime stories”. Read on!

LEARN WITH BOOM

Two videos were circulated to show top Indian officials admitting to losing jets and soldiers during the recent conflict with Pakistan. But, are these authentic videos? Let’s find out.

Exhibit A: Video of General Upendra Dwivedi, Chief of Army Staff (COAS) shared with the caption: “Breaking: Indian Army Chief admits losing 6 jets and 250 soldiers in war against Pakistan.(sic)”

Fact: BOOM ran the 40-second video through two AI deepfake voice detection tools: Hiya Deepfake Voice Detector and DeepFake-O-Meter by UB Media Forensics Lab. Both tools' results confirmed that the voice in the viral video saying, “We have already lost six jets and two hundred and fifty soldiers” was overlaid onto the original footage. 

In the original address by General Upendra Dwivedi, Chief of Army Staff, delivered on August 4, 2025, at IIT Madras, Chennai, he did not make any mention of India losing six jets to Pakistan or 250 soldiers. The speech focused on the strategic importance of technology, civil readiness, and public participation in future conflicts.

Exhibit B: Video of Indian Air Chief Marshal AP Singh shared with the caption: "Breaking: Finally Indian Airforce Chief admits India did lose 6 Jets and one Heron UAV during May 7th Air engagements.(sic)"

Fact: BOOM found the original video, which was posted by ANI on August 9, 2025. In the video, Singh makes no such admission while speaking about the damage caused by the Indian Air Force during Operation Sindoor. 

Next, we tested the audio of the viral video, where the alleged admission of losing six Indian jets is heard, using Resemble AI. The platform’s audio detector flagged the audio as fake.

DECODE

Spotify Has Sexually Explicit Audio And Indian Kids Can Hear It All

A few months ago, a Reddit user made a disturbing discovery: his 14-year-old brother had been saving sexually explicit audio clips on Spotify. The playlists were innocuously titled “Good pods,” “Follow for more,” and “Requests.” None carried any warning that they weren’t meant for children. 

When the brother tried to report the content, the process proved "extremely frustrating". For each piece of content, he had to verify his email, enter a code, complete multiple “are you human?” checks, and select the reason for his complaint.

In India—Spotify’s second-largest market—the problem is bigger than bad search results. There’s no Spotify Kids app, no effective age checks, and no law forcing platforms to filter explicit audio. As Decode’s Hera Rizwan found, even the most innocent search terms can serve up sexually explicit material, often with suggestive thumbnails.

LAW, JUSTICE ET AL

How Section 152 BNS Continues The Legacy of Sedition

Manipuri journalist Kishore Wangkhemcha is full of hope. Again. Wangkhemcha’s optimism was buoyed after the Supreme Court issued notice on two pleas—(Retd) Major General SG Vombatkere and Siddharth Vardarajan, founding editor of news portal The Wire—challenging the constitutionality of Section 152 of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita, 2023 – which most consider to be the “new” sedition law. 

Background: In 2022, the Supreme Court suspended Section 124 - A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 on a batch of pleas including those filed by Wangkhemcha, Vombatkere, and Varadarajan - through the Foundation of Media Professionals. 

What’s the need?: Wangkhemcha said he couldn’t comprehend the need for Section 152 in today’s times. “I can still understand the colonial legacy attached to sedition which was introduced by the British. It must’ve been relevant then. But what about now? One must review whether laws like sedition that directly affect one’s personal liberty are relevant in today’s times,” the journalist told Ritika Jain.

Experts say: Experts believe Section 152 of the BNS is nothing but a reincarnation of Section 124-A of the IPC with “cosmetic changes”. Section 152 “bears a striking resemblance” to the sedition clause under the IPC, and the Centre re-introduced section 124-A – which was suspended by the Supreme Court in 2022, with a “vengeance”.

EXPLAINED

Grok Pulled Offline, Then Reappears. Did Israel-Gaza Comments Spark It?

Recently, X users spotted something out of the ordinary: Grok—the platform’s AI chatbot, popular for fact-checking and sparring with other users’ arguments— seemed to have been briefly suspended. A screenshot claiming to show the suspension quickly spread across the micro-blogging site, fueling confusion and speculation. 

Upon return, Grok called the screenshot “fake” but gave multiple, often contradictory reasons for its absence. 

Possible reasons include being flagged for hate speech, violating X’s hateful conduct rules, mass reporting and technical glitches. Read Hera Rizwan’s report.

'FAKE NEWS’ YOU ALMOST FELL FOR

🔍 An unrelated photo showing dead bodies from a road accident in Gonda, Uttar Pradesh, where a vehicle plunged into a canal killing 11 people was falsely linked to the recent flash floods in Uttarkashi, Uttarakhand. Read 🔗 Anmol Alphonso’s ↗️ fact-check.

🔍 Does this video of a mob walking down a dirt road armed with bamboo sticks show illegal Bangladeshi immigrants heading to attack officials in Assam’s Goalpara district? Find out in 🔗 Srijit Das’ ↗️  fact-check.

🔍 A morphed image of Indian Air Force's Chinook helicopter airlifting an excavator to conduct rescue operations in Uttarkashi's Dharali after the flash floods, was viral as real. 🔗 Rohit Kumar ↗️ debunked the claim.

🅱️ RECOMMENDS

This week's recommendation is: How Wikipedia is fighting AI slop content

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