#trending: Japan's viral 'sushi terrorism' trend strikes again as prankster sprays disinfectant on food

JAPAN — A video of a Sushiro customer caught on camera spraying disinfectant on a sushi conveyor belt has surfaced on Twitter recently after pranks of similar nature made rounds on Twitter in January. 

Dubbed "sushi terrorism", these pranks — usually involving patrons contaminating utensils, dishes or condiments — have sparked outrage on social media.

Sushiro, the largest sushi chain in Japan, confirmed that a video involving the spraying of disinfectant was circulating on social media, according to Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun.

The video, believed to have been first posted online last November, was reposted by a Twitter user last Friday (Feb 24). It has since attracted more than seven million views in four days.

In this viral video, a man spritzes alcohol disinfectant on the sushi conveyor belt and on at least two plates of sushi that are not covered at a Sushiro branch in Kikuyo, Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan.

A representative from Sushiro told Yomiuri Shimbun that the incident will be handled as a criminal and civil offence, and that the company is working together with the police.

In light of the recent incident, Sushiro said that it has removed all disinfectant sprays from tables.

Japanese online users reacted in horror to the Twitter video, with some expressing fear over being a victim of sushi terrorism. 

A Twitter user commented: “It's terrible. I can't go to a conveyor belt sushi anymore after seeing this.”

Another highlighted the possible health risks that may result from the prank: “If you eat this, you'll die.”

One other wrote: “I have an alcohol allergy. This is a life threatening situation for such people.”

'SUSHI TERO' ON THE RISE

Past incidents of "sushi terrorism" have prompted stocks at Sushiro’s parent company, Food & Life Companies Co Ltd, to plunge nearly 5 per cent.

In one video, a Sushiro customer licked the top of a communal soy sauce bottle and the rim of a tea cup. If this was not enough to make anyone sick, the patron was also filmed licking his fingers before smearing his saliva on a piece of sushi at the chain’s Gifu city branch. 

The stomach-churning video, which has received 43 million views on Twitter, sparked outrage in Japan, a country that has a reputation for having high standards of hygiene. 

Pranks videos in general are not new, but the recent clips seemed to have spawned copycats who have also gone viral.

More recently on Feb 19, a man was spotted licking a bunch of chopsticks before placing them back into the holder with other presumably clean chopsticks at a ramen chain in Osaka, Japan. The video has received more than 200,000 views on Twitter.

At the end of the video, he grins while his companion who was filming egged him on. 

Other videos have also emerged in recent months showing patrons placing heaps of wasabi on passing pieces of sushi or eating half of a biscuit from a dessert dish before putting it back on the same dish to make it appear as if it is ready to be served.

The Washington Post reported that these videos seem to be a spillover of an existing Japanese YouTube trend known as “meiwaku-douga,” or nuisance videos, where YouTubers film videos of themselves causing trouble just for attention.