LINE Corporation has banned cartoon stickers that lampoons the Thai royal family and issued an apology for its lack of “cultural sensitivity”. Meanwhile, the Thai police are searching for the stickers’ creators.
The sticker set, created by Anna Laurent, believed to be a pseudonym, was removed from the application before 4 am on Thursday. The set is composed of 40 cartoon images, involving six main characters -- a father, a mother and their four grown-up children. A description of the set read ‘A happy family wants to share its emotions with the world . . .”
The sticker set cost 30 Thai baht.
On Thursday, 7 April 2016, Line Global’s facebook page has apologized Thai users for the controversial sticker set:
“LINE Corporation is aware of the culturally sensitive sticker set that may have caused discomfort among our users in Thailand. The sticker set in question has been pulled from the LINE Sticker Shop.
As we take our users concerns seriously and consider cultural aspects of each country, we will continue to improve our LINE Creators Market.
We regret any inconvenience this may have caused and appreciate your understanding.”
Reuters reported on Thursday afternoon that the Technology Crime Suppression Division is investigating the creator of the stickers.
"We are investigating where the stickers came from and who did this," said Col Somporn Daengdee, deputy chief of the police's Technology Crime Suppression Division.
He declined to say more due to the sensitivity of the issue, Reuters reported.
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