While they’re not the first mainstream television station to inadvertently broadcast sex to thousands of viewers, Sweden’s TV4 News might have set the record for staying power on Monday morning.
For 10 minutes at about 10 a.m., viewers of TV4 News watched hard-core pornography broadcast on the screen behind two journalists talking about the Syrian crisis.
TV4 News might be compared to CNN, and it’s certainly not the place you’d expect sex on screen.
The set features numerous screens behind the anchor desk. As pundits discussed Russia’s involvement in the Syrian civil war, a naked woman writhed behind them.
“At first I realized I was looking at a naked woman and it quickly became clear she was having sex,” viewer Danyal Ek told The Local.
“The image wasn't exactly in focus, but it wasn't hard to figure out what was going on.”
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The broadcasters blamed a technical error, saying it wasn’t an act of revenge from a former employee and it wasn’t that staff watches porn at work.
Ironically enough, media company C More Entertainment owns TV4 and several cable stations that sometimes broadcast adult films.
Something must have gone haywire, a TV4 representative said.
“We will do everything to make it not happen again,” managing editor Andrew Haglind told The Expressen newspaper.
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