Zoomnappings – a new virtual trend where students fake their kidnapping to skip Zoom classes

A recent video of a college student faking his kidnapping during a Zoom call has gone viral, sparking a trend dubbed Zoomnappings.

In the 23-second video, a college student called Tyler is seen sitting during an online lecture when two hooded figures suddenly emerge and drag him from the room.

At first the lecturer continues with the work at hand as some of the students giggle in the background. He then pauses to ask, “Did you guys just see Tyler get kidnapped?”

Many online users were concerned about the youngster's safety, but in fact Tyler staged his kidnapping so he could get out of his class, FoxNews reports.

He later shared an explainer video on TikTok with his friends Jake and Horace – the baddies in the hoodies – revealing that he was safe and thanking everyone for their concern.

Since Tyler’s video with his friends, Zoomnappings have gained popularity, with many students jumping on the bandwagon.

Check out these bizarre Zoomnappings.

Getting out of Zoom meetings has clearly become a thing. Earlier this year Twitter user Matt Buckley shared a nifty loop video trick to zoom in and out of meetings.

The conferencing app allows you to customize your own background and using this tool, Mark created a demonstration post of himself in which he shares a fake video of ten to 15 seconds of himself pretending to be at his desk.

Mark found this customizing feature while he was playing around with the app, according to The Sun.

“The virtual background feature came to my attention because I love clicking around inside of new programs and seeing what’s there,” he explained.

“Additionally, some younger colleagues were using the feature in a meeting the other day (mostly to hide messy rooms, apparently), and I thought it would be fun to play around with it even more.”

For those looking to check out the customization tool, it’s only available on the Zoom’s subscription option.

Another Twitter user David Muttering, asked tweeps to share creative ways to dodge virtual meetings, parties, and classes.

People didn’t hold back at their outrageous responses with one user referring to the classic connectivity issues.

Another user shared the trick of using a high pitched sound recorded sound of a whistle, rustling a crisp packet to mimic a breaking up sound, and covering your camera with a piece of duct tape in an attempt to get asked to leave the meeting.

Sources: The Sun, FoxNews, Twitter, TikTok, Instagram