Skip in Skip x Embed x Share CLOSE Columnist Jennifer Jolly has tips on what they mean, when to be alarmed and when not to worry about texting codes. Jennifer Jolly for USA TODAY 
 
 A mother and daughter have a serious chat. (Photo: Ryan McVay/Getty Images) 
 
 PHOENIX — Arizona schools are warning parents about a social-media challenge that encourages kids to ever-increasing harmful behavior that ends in suicide. 
 
 Parents were alerted to the the “Blue Whale Challenge” by schools and Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery on Wednesday. 
 
 “I do want to make parents aware of this so they can have a conversation with their kids that if anybody starts talking to them about participating in the blue whale game or anything related to it,” Montgomery said. “Understand that this can have severely tragic consequences.” 
 
 The Blue Whale Challenge was called one of the “scariest and the most mysterious” YouTube challenges your kids will try by Common Sense Media, a non-profit that promotes online safety. 
 
 How it works 
 
 Over the course of 50 days, an anonymous administrator assigns kids self-harm tasks. The challenges may start by asking kids to watch a scary movie and then grow increasingly dangerous to include acts like cutting. On the 50th day, the participant is supposed to commit suicide. The game can reach kids through social-media channels like Instagram, SnapChat, YouTube and texting. 
 
 The trend was reported to have begun in Russia but that has been disproven, as have concerns that it has been linked to an increase in suicide. But what may have started as a hoax worries educators because it targets a vulnerable teen population. 
 
 Read more: 
 
 Phoenix’s Madison School District sent an email through its PTO on Facebook Wednesday. 
 
 The post said the Blue Whale Challenge “has become a viral trend with some students on middle school campuses in the Madison School District.” 
 
 "Social media can push teens to do dangerous things in order to feel included with their peers," the post said. 
 
 Having the conversation 
 
 Joronda Montaño of the non-profit Phoenix organization NotMyKid, which addresses teen challenges like online safety, said the Blue Whale Challenge only recently became a topic of conversation. 
 
 Montaño, the group's program director, said parents should start by asking their children open-ended questions. 
 
 "Simply ask, 'Are there any new games online that you're hearing about or that you and your friends are playing that are popular on Instagram and Snapchat? Are there any popular challenges?' Take an inventory first," she said. 
 
 It's a game called "blue whale", an online challenge that ends with a suicide. Please check on your teenage children. pic.twitter.com/dpGtWMOppz — Tejaswi Shahir (@TejaswiShahir) May 1, 2017 
 
 Middle schoolers and teens are wary of anything that will get them into trouble with parents, Montaño said. So adopt a neutral tone. 
 
 Let middle-school kids lead the discussion, but it's appropriate to ask older kids directly about the Blue Whale Challenge. 
 
 "Then ask, 'And what about that would I be most concerned about?' " Montaño said. 
 
 Parents should also search hashtags like #BlueWhaleChallenge on the social sites their kids use, she said. 
 
 Follow Snoja Haller on Twitter: @sonjahaller 
 
 Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2rWbebV ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| ATLANTA, Ga. (CNN Newsource) — One family believes an online game led a 16-year-old girl to commit suicide. 
 
 The game is called “Blue Whale” and it reportedly incites players to take their own lives. 
 
 It’s still not clear if the game really exists or not. 
 
 She was young, beautiful and playful. 
 
 Her family wants to share the teen’s story, but asked CNN to conceal her identity. 
 
 “A funny girl. Like to make silly faces, or, how we say, the puppy face when she want something,” her mom said. 
 
 She was a talented artist, talented enough to hide secrets in her paintings. 
 
 “So these were paintings that she drew that were displayed at an art show at school,” her brother said. “At first look, you don’t think anything of it, you just think of an abstract painting.” 
 
 But there were clues that even her brother didn’t see. 
 
 Not until the teen girl took her own life. 
 
 “If you were to Google ‘what a skeleton of a blue whale looks like,’ it has a tremendous resemblance.” 
 
 Blue Whale is described as an online suicide game. 
 
 The game reportedly started in Russia two years ago and has been linked to teen suicides all over the world. 
 
 The thing is, it’s not clear if the game actually exists, or whether it’s an Internet rumor that caught the attention of vulnerable children and teens. 
 
 Through a 50-day challenge, players are supposedly given 50 daily tasks by an anonymous administrator and must submit photo evidence each day to prove each task is complete 
 
 On the last day, those who play are told to commit suicide. 
 
 Last month, the Baldwin County Public School System in Georgia issued a warning to parents the a game that encourages players to harm themselves and potentially commit suicide. 
 
 The “Blue Whale” game has reached two high schools in Baldwin County, though officials wouldn’t confirm which ones. 
 
 “I start researching and start reading more about the game, what it’s asking. Then I start to put some of the pieces — how during the weekend she asked me to step on the roof of the house,” the girl’s mother said. 
 
 “I realized one of the pictures is from our roof, and it’s something that the game asked,” the mom added. 
 
 Originally from Bulgaria, the family has been in the U.S. for 15 years, unaware of any communication the teenager had outside of the country, if any. 
 
 “I am a whale. This is basically saying goodbye and this is basically saying goodbye as well. With the Blue Whale,” her brother said looking at drawings the girl did. 
 
 “This is in Russian, it’s not in Bulgarian, yes,” the brother added. 
 
 The brother said the family didn’t know if the girl knew Russian. 
 
 While authorities aren’t clear if the so-called “game” is real, it’s caught their attention. 
 
 Warnings about blue whale circulate in parts the country. 
 
 “It’s a real thing. I lost my sister to it, or at least part of it. I would say by the looks of everything we found it’s a major part of it,” the brother said. 
 
 “And there needs to be awareness, people need to know, parents need to know, to look for signs, to monitor their kids a little better. And try to know and understand who they’re talking to and when,” the girl’s brother said. 
 
 Mental health experts say it’s critical for parents and children to be aware of the internet’s impact when it comes to teen suicide. 
 
 “There’s a lot of good information out there to help kids think through what’s fiction, what’s not fiction,” said Dr. Jane Pearson of the National Institute of Mental Health. 
 
 “You can imagine another trend might come up at any time, so instead of trying to catch every trend, a better approach might be to improve social media literacy. To help kids understand how to manage it,” Pearson said. 
 
 As law enforcement investigates the circumstances of the suicide, the family continues to search for evidence hoping their tragedy will prevent others from falling prey to Blue Whale. 
 
 She was “happy. And as my little sister that I love, and I miss,” her brother said.
– Because parents don't have enough to worry about, both in the virtual and real worlds, a warning is now circulating about an online dare that could spur kids to engage in self-harm. Massachusetts' Sun Chronicle reports that school officials there emailed parents last week about the "Blue Whale Challenge," a "game" shared through social media that allegedly puts kids in touch with "an anonymous curator," who then eggs users to complete a series of challenges over 50 days. USA Today documented it in May: It often starts with a fairly innocuous task—watching a horror movie, perhaps—and moves on to increasingly dangerous ones, such as cutting, before finally asking the participants to kill themselves on the 50th day. Per the Washington Post, school districts nationwide are addressing the murky challenge, though some people claim it's just a hoax to scare parents. The challenge is said to circulate via popular online mediums such as texting, Snapchat, and Instagram. Although some say deaths caused by the game are just urban legend—the Sun Chronicle says it's "unclear" if the challenge has been tied to actual deaths—the Post notes the apparent recent suicide of 15-year-old Isaiah Gonzalez, whose family says he was a Blue Whale victim. A teen in Atlanta also took her own life after participating in the challenge, her family tells CNN. Police and school officials say the game preys on vulnerable youth, and some are fighting back by saturating #BlueWhaleChallenge hashtags with warnings. Per the Sun Chronicle, one school superintendent says parents should check out their kids' social media accounts for related hashtags or pics of blue whales, noting they need to be "policing [their kids' online] environment."