The Toronto Catholic District School Board is begging students to stop blowing up their laptops

Last Friday, the Toronto Catholic District School Board sent an email warning parents about a slew of social media trends including the Chromebook Challenge. TCDSB students have been injured and suspended for taking part in these activities on school property, according to the Toronto Star, and fire departments have already responded to “several” incidents, according to a post on X from Ontario’s fire marshal.

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TikTok trends can range from kind of stupid to extremely dangerous, and the Chromebook Challenge lands somewhere between the latest viral dance craze (cringey but unlikely to land anyone in the hospital) and the Blackout Challenge (self-asphyxiation that has resulted in multiple deaths). To take part, students jam metallic objects like paper clips or staples into the USB ports of their school-issued Chromebooks.

The goal of the challenge is to short-circuit the devices, resulting in smoke and fire. Students then upload the classroom chaos to social media, where pyro cred appears to be having a moment (See also: the Paper Clip Challenge, where the same metallic objects are jammed into outlets.)

Like so many noxious trends these days, this one arrives in Canada courtesy of our southern neighbours. A Good Morning America report last month noted that the Colorado Springs Fire Department had responded to more than 30 instances of Chromebook Challenge–related incidents in just a few weeks. A high school in Connecticut was evacuated due to the trend, and in New Jersey, a 15-year-old student was booked on arson charges.

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Here in Canada, school boards in Edmonton were the first to clock the trend after one high school had to call in the fire department. Now, the TCDSB is urging parents to talk to their kids about electrical safety, and fire officials are warning of the specific risks associated with lithium ion fumes. (The TDSB told the Star that it has not received any reports of exploding Chromebooks, although it is dealing with the Senior Assassin Challenge.)

So why has this trend taken off? A logical if unsatisfying theory points to still-in-development frontal cortexes colliding with the allure of social media celebrity. (This meme does a pretty good job of breaking it down.) TikTok has attempted to put out the fire by making the videos unsearchable on its platform: type in “Chromebook Challenge” and you’ll get redirected to a page about the company’s commitment to safety.

But teens are going to teen, which means they’ll surely find a series of covert workarounds—ones the rest of us, who would never dream of jamming a piece of metal into an electrical socket for strangers’ likes, are too old and uncool to know about.