About

The Penny Challenge or Outlet Challenge is an internet challenge where the participant films themself or another person plugging a phone charger halfway into a power outlet and then holding a penny against the charger's half-exposed prongs, resulting in the person getting an electrical shock or the outlet burning. The trend went viral on TikTok in January 2020 and attracted criticism from the media, who warned parents and potential participants about the dangers of the trend, saying it can cause fires and injuries. In late 2021 an Alexa virtual assistant suggested the challenge to a 10-year-old girl, causing outrage.

Origin

The Penny Challenge became popularized on TikTok around January 2020, commonly known as the "Outlet Challenge." The challenge saw TikTokers film themselves plugging a phone charger halfway into a power outlet and then holding a penny against the half-exposed prongs, often resulting in an electrical shock and damage to the outlet due to shorting. A compilation of the trend was posted to YouTube^[1] on January 23rd, 2020, gaining over 267,000 views in just under two years (age-restricted). The hashtag "#outletchallenge" has since been blocked on TikTok and many of the videos have been removed following backlash against the trend for potentially causing fires and bodily harm to participants. Inside Edition^[2] posted a video warning parents about the challenge on the same day, gaining over 1.6 million views in the same span of time (shown below). Global News^[3] published a story on January 30th, 2020.

Spread

Alexa Suggests The Penny Challenge

On December 26th, 2021, Twitter^[4] user @klivdahl posted "OMFG My 10 year old just asked Alexa on our Echo for a challenge and this is what she said," along with a screenshot of her phone screen showing Alexa results for the prompt "Tell me a challenge to do." The Amazon Echo device suggested the Penny Challenge to the 10-year-old (shown below). The tweet gained over 16,400 likes and 2,900 retweets in three days.

On December 28th, 2021, BBC News^[5] reported on the story, where @klivdahl said she and her daughter were doing physical challenges and wanted more, so said "tell me a challenge to do" to their Amazon Echo, resulting in the Penny Challenge suggestion. Amazon made an official statement to BBC, saying: "Customer trust is at the centre 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."

Various Examples

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Search Interest

External References