The selling app popular with teenagers, models and celebrities, Depop (pictured) is peddling bundles of drugs to children as young as 13
A trendy selling app popular with teenagers, models and celebrities is peddling bundles of drugs to children as young as 13.
Depop, a mobile app used to buy and sell clothing, mobile phones, jewellery, art and music, is now openly advertising cannabis and drug paraphernalia.
The alternative to eBay, which has been used by the likes of Philip Schofield, Girls Aloud star Sarah Harding and Kate Moss’s model sister Lottie Moss to flog old clothes, has been found to offer ‘smoking bundles’.
An investigation last week revealed items on offer including laughing gas, rolling tobacco, imported cigarettes, vodka, marijuana and ‘pre-rolled spliffs’.
Drug paraphernalia, such as pipes for smoking drugs, were also available on the app, which takes a 10 per cent cut of all digital transactions.
Users of the London-based app are typically aged between 16 and 26, although anyone can open an account from the age of 13.
On its website, Depop insists it prohibits the sale of drugs and drugs paraphernalia, but dealers can be found aggressively marketing their wares to children.
Philip Schofield (left) and Kate Moss’s model sister Lottie Moss (right) have both been known to flog old clothes on the Depop app
A common practice is for Depop sellers to deploy sugary sweets and Hollywood film brands to entice young users into buying drug ‘bundles’ of various drug products.
In one listing, a bag of pick’n’mix sweets is prominently displayed as part of a £17.50 ‘smoking bundle’ that includes ‘a Rastafari-themed marijuana grinder’ and marijuana pipe.
In another, a water pipe in the shape of the Star Wars character Yoda forms the centrepiece of a bundle described as ‘a perfect gift for yourself or a friend who loves Star Wars as much as smoking bud [marijuana]’.
The investigation by the Sunday Times comes after the Mail revealed earlier this month how drug dealers are openly using social media to target children.
Drug paraphernalia: Smoking pipes for smoking illegal drugs were found to be sold openly on the app among clothes, art and old phones (file photo)
Scores of criminals are freely touting for business on sites including Facebook Instagram and Twitter.
Depop, which claims to buy and sell ‘the most inspiring and unique things’, is less well known.
But the firm set up in 2011 already has eight million registered users and last week it announced it had raised £14million to accelerate its global expansion.
The app is credited with inspiring a generation of young entrepreneurs, while celebrities including the burlesque performer Dita Von Teese and former basketball star Shaquille O’Neal have ‘shops’ on the app.
Karen Tyrell from Addaction, a drug addiction charity, said the findings were ‘worrying’, adding: ‘The internet and social media is an increasingly challenging environment for young people and parents to navigate.’
Depop said less than one per cent of the app’s current listings are ‘prohibited items’ and it stated that it employs people to work 20 hours a day to remove anything that is against its rules