MTA chief wants ‘Russian roulette’ subway surf videos off social media
MTA Chairman Janno Lieber demanded Wednesday that social media companies take down viral videos of New Yorkers “surfing” atop subway trains, comparing it to sharing footage of people playing Russian roulette.
Lieber’s comments to WNYC radio came just days after a Manhattan teenager died attempting the dangerous, illegal stunt on a J train as it crossed the Williamsburg Bridge.
“The right thing to do is to not put up these videos, which obviously have negative consequences,” Lieber told host Brian Lehrer. “If they were running videos of people playing Russian roulette with live bullets, they would understand the consequences and this is the equivalent for kids.”
The MTA says the number of reports of people riding outside of trains — including on top of them — more than quadrupled to 928 in 2022 from 206 in 2021.
That’s also nearly double the 490 such reports received in 2019, before the onset of COVID-19 sent subway ridership plummeting.
Officials say the surge is fueled in part by teens attempting to replicate daredevil stunts depicted in social media videos.
“The social media companies have figured out ways to micro-target all of us,” Lieber declared Wednesday. “I have no concern that if they were focused on this that they wouldn’t be able to find those types of videos. I mean, we’re able to find them just by doing a couple of Google searches.
“It’s really a question of will and intention and a sense of doing the right thing.”
A spokesman for Meta — the parent company of Facebook and Instagram — said the company has reached out to the MTA and is planning a call to discuss an Orwellian-sounding “thought partnership” next week about the train surfing videos.
“Meta takes this very seriously and is open to discussions about finding ways to contribute,” the representative added.
Tiktok and Twitter did not respond to requests for comment.
Cops say 15-year-old Zackery Nazario fatally struck his head on a beam of the Williamsburg Bridge on Monday after he turned around for a split second to look at his girlfriend while riding atop a train crossing the span.
Nazario’s grieving mother told The Post on Tuesday that her son was funny and kind.
“The family is hurt,” she said, describing her son as a “very, very nice kid.”
With reporting by Thomas Barrabi