The children's song application unexpectedly displayed inappropriate adult advertisements, attracting parents' attention. The company immediately apologized, stating that the ads came from third-party platforms and that all ads on the relevant platforms were taken offline as soon as possible.
According to a report by "The Paper", the Chinese children’s early education brand "BabyBus" and its popular app "BabyBus Nursery Rhymes" were found to have problematic splash screen ads. Some ads redirect users, upon launching the app, to third-party pages containing adult content, vulgar borderline live streams, and other material unsuitable for children, sparking concern and complaints from many parents.
Some netizens said that their phones are mainly used by their children daily. Recently, they discovered multiple unfamiliar software installed without reason. Upon investigation, they suspected that while children were using the "BabyBus Nursery Rhymes" app, their inability to distinguish advertising prompts led to accidental clicks on the ads, which caused unwanted redirects to inappropriate pages or even triggered software downloads.
This person expressed concerns that such situations can easily expose children to harmful information.
BabyBus’s customer service admitted on October 28 that in non-member status, ads provided by third-party platforms are indeed shown in the app. The platform usually reviews and supervises the ad content, but also acknowledged that lapses may occur in the review process. Customer service called these vulgar ads an “abnormal situation,” and said they would report it to the technical department for investigation and resolution.
Additionally, a BabyBus spokesperson further responded to the incident the next day, pointing out that the problematic ads came from third-party advertising platforms, and expressed sincere apologies for the negative impact on users' experiences.
The company emphasized that it attaches great importance to this matter, has quickly initiated self-inspection and correction, and implemented several rectification measures, including promptly taking down all ads on the corresponding platforms and strengthening communication with advertising platforms to improve review and blocking mechanisms.
Moreover, BabyBus has also independently developed a compulsory ad-blocking function to proactively block advertisers whose ads the platform cannot effectively monitor.
According to public information, BabyBus is a brand dedicated to digital early learning products for children. Since its launch in 2011, with panda characters “Kiki” and “Miumiu” as its core images, it has released a wide range of early learning content, including nursery rhymes, animations, and interactive apps. Its products cover language, health, science, society, art, and other fields. At present, BabyBus has launched over 200 apps, owns more than 2,500 nursery rhyme animations and over 5,000 audio stories, and has accumulated a global family user base of 700 million.