A 22-year-old financial analyst is under investigation for masterminding a notorious online "game" encouraging vulnerable teenagers to commit suicide. Russian Nikita Nearonov is being probed over grooming 10 "underage" girls for death.

Police believe he was a "major and dangerous" perpetrator of the Blue Whale social media "game", although Nearonov has not confessed and insists he was just being "friendly" to the girls. In two of the 10 cases for which he has been charged, girls aged 14 and 17 are known to have survived. If convicted, he faces up to six years in jail relating to these alleged victims.