Amazon has found itself in hot water after a viewer complained that a film containing sexual content played to their children instead of the PG movie they had rented on Prime Video.
Consequently, the streamer has been found in breach of Ofcom’s programming rules.
The user rented Diary of a Wimpy Kid, a family comedy flick released in 2010, based on the hit novel of the same name.
However, this is not the film they received.
Instead, the film that played to the family was Love & Other Drugs, a 2010 romantic comedy drama starring Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal, which contains ‘strong sex, sex references and language’, according to the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), which rated it a 15.
In stark contrast, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, starring Zachary Gordon as main character Greg Heffley, is rated PG. This is due to its use of ‘mild language’.
‘After the selected content began playing, the complainant became aware that the film that had actually played was a different film containing strong sexual content,’ Ofcom said of the matter.
The complainant then contacted the UK communications watchdog after they received no contact from Amazon following three phone calls.
As a result, Amazon was found to have broken a rule for providers of on-demand programme services (ODPS), which says ‘a person providing an on-demand programme service must take appropriate measures to ensure that any specially restricted material is made available by the service in a manner which secures that persons under the age of 18 will not normally see or hear it’.
In response, Amazon apologised for the error and said the issue was escalated and fixed in less than 48 hours. They added that 122 customers had attempted to access Diary of a Wimpy Kid during that time.
The film was only available to rent or purchase and was not free as part of a subscription, meaning it was not available on Prime Video child profiles, which, by default, prohibit rentals and purchases.
Ofcom acknowledged Amazon’s assurances that it had updated its procedures to prevent the issue from occurring again.
But it was still ruled that the incident was a breach of ODPS Rule 12, adding: ‘Ofcom expects ODPS providers to act quickly in circumstances where they become aware of ongoing issues that may result in harm to children or audiences more broadly.’
Diary of a Wimpy Kid is a children’s film based on Jeff Kinney’s 2007 book about middle school boy Greg Heffley, while Love & Other Drugs is about a pharmaceutical salesman who starts a relationship with a young woman diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.
The website of the BBFC, which is the video regulator for the UK, says the romantic comedy includes ‘occasional sex scenes between a man and woman’, ‘references to oral sex,’ and ‘brief drug misuse’.
This is not the first time Amazon Prime Video has found itself at the centre of controversy recently.
Just days ago, the streamer was forced to pull the AI recap of Fallout season 1 after fans noticed huge inaccuracies.
In one AI voiceover moment, the date of a flashback scene was off by 100 years, and in another, the end-of-series climax was wrongly summarised.
This led to fans raging across social media, even going as far as to urge others not to watch the show.
Many called the mishap an ’embarrassment’ for Amazon, while others raged over the use of ‘AI slop’.
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