Image showing a human skull. For representational purposes.
Credit: iStock Photo
An influencer in China who has been teaching people how to clean bloodstains and bone residue from household items has sparked concern on social media about the crime-related implications of his work.
Using the pseudonym Hua, the man, who claims to be a senior researcher at a biotechnology institute, has garnered over 350,000 followers on a mainland China-based short-video sharing platform.
Hua's videos offer many cleaning solutions: in one, he is seen pouring hydrogen peroxide and toilet cleaner on bloodstains in the washroom; in another, he demonstrates how toothpaste can be used to remove bloodstains from pants. In yet another video, he uses a luminol reagent and a UV light to detect traces of blood that remain after cleaning.
For those unaware, luminol is widely used in forensic science to detect old traces of blood that has been wiped.
But that's not all: the Chinese influencer, in one video, shows how to dissolve bones by soaking them in drain cleaner and hot water.
In one video, the influencer even demonsrates how to extract fingerprints from a phone screen using a talcum power.
Most of Hua's videos have views in the thousands, some even in the hundreds of thousands, and even the drain cleaner which he uses has seen a spike in online sales, reports South China Morning Post.
While some raised alarm bells over the kind of content Hua has been posting and their potential for misuse, others defended the influencer and his supposed solutions to 'household problems'.
Even the research institute Hua works for has come to his defence, saying that the influencer is merely creating engaging content.
"We would never teach people to commit crimes. Our goal is to educate on chemical principles and safe cleaning practices," a spokesperson for the institute was quoted as saying by SCMP.
Hua, however, has yet to comment on the controversy.