Mehr als 700 Briten haben Nachrichten auf einer Selbsttötungs-Website hinterlassen, auf der Suizidgefährdete einen Partner suchen, um sich gemeinsam das Leben zu nehmen. Ein Rechercheteam des Senders BBC berichtete, die Website habe eine Sektion „Nur für Mitglieder“, in der Interessierte Partner für eine Selbsttötung suchen könnten. Die Recherche habe überdies ergeben, dass auf der Seite Sexualtäter psychisch instabilen Frauen auflauerten.
The BBC reported that it had been able to trace several double suicides back to the online dating forum. In December 2019, a 28-year-old man from the Midlands traveled to Scotland, rented a holiday home there and committed suicide together with a woman he had previously met on the forum. His mother has since spent a lot of time researching the website. “It's a very dangerous place,” she told the BBC.
It is like the darknet version of a dating app. The forum encourages its users to take their own lives and also offers instructions on how to do so. The BBC says it has found more than 5,000 entries in the site's forum, whose names and addresses it deliberately does not want to disclose. According to an earlier investigation by the broadcaster, more than 130 Britons are said to have committed suicide by taking a chemical substance recommended on the site.
“I could cover hotel costs”
The BBC's research team constructed an anonymous profile of their own to get in touch with other users of the site. Users enter their age, gender and place of residence as well as their preferred method of death and then look for someone who wants to die with them. The entry of a woman named Linda read: “I am 54, female, living near London. I am mobile and could cover hotel costs if that works out. Of course it would be good to chat first.” Linda died in 2023 in a hotel in Romford, east London.
Her sister Helen said she was found on the bed “next to a complete stranger.” According to the BBC, Helen's other sister Sarah was so distraught over Linda's death that she logged onto the forum and killed herself with the same substance recommended there.
During the research, it also emerged that the site was being used by sex offenders to specifically establish contact with mentally unstable women. In a court case in Glasgow two years ago, it became public how a 31-year-old man responded to a series of posts from young women looking for a suicide partner.
Strangled until unconscious
He had persuaded one of them to come to his apartment to “practice” suicide. There he strangled her until she lost consciousness. When he was arrested, it turned out that the man in question had made similar suggestions for “advice and support” to other women at risk of suicide.
The BBC asked British politicians what options there are to stop these Internet brokers. The now-defeated Conservative government created an “Online Safety Act” a year ago that would give a regulator (Ofcom) the ability to take action against the website. However, Ofcom will not be given the power to impose sanctions until the end of the year.
A spokesperson for the authority told the BBC that since the website is based in the United States, it would be “quite difficult” to take legal action against it. The head of the authority said that after the operators were informed that their actions were illegal, they temporarily blocked the site for users in Great Britain. However, the blocking is no longer effective.