Police are looking into a Chinese influencer after a video showing her cooking and devouring a great white shark went viral.
The vlogger, who goes under the internet alias Tizi, was captured on camera gorging on the great white, which authorities in Nanchong, in central China, identified as such on Sunday.
In a mid-July video, Tizi said, “It may look violent, but its meat is genuinely incredibly delicate,” while tearing off sizable pieces of the roasted meat.
She can be seen in the video, which has since been taken down, unwrapping a two-meter-long fish and lying down next to it to demonstrate how much taller it is than her.
The shark’s head is cooked in a hot broth after being split in half, marinated, and grilled.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature has designated great white sharks as a vulnerable species, which is the last category before being labeled as endangered.
Shark populations, which are among the most significant apex predators in the ocean, have suffered over the past few decades, primarily as a result of industrial longline fishing and shark finning.
They are classified as protected in China. A five- to ten-year prison sentence is possible for illegal possession.
One commenter in response to the story said, “It is flabbergasting that an internet celebrity can consume a protected species in front of millions in broad daylight!”
Another person said, “These uncultured attention-seekers will go to any length to get attention!”
If Tizi, who has approximately 8 million followers, will be penalized is unknown.
Her assertion was “inconsistent with the facts,” the local agriculture bureau stated on Monday, adding that police were looking into it.
She had previously informed local media that she had purchased the shark through “legitimate methods.”
In China, dried baby shark flesh is sold in a variety of online retailers for usage as cat food.
Viral binge-eating videos, also known as “mukbang” in Korean, have long been a target of Chinese state media, and livestreaming sites have long made empty promises to remove accounts that encourage overeating and food waste.