Faked footage of a robot in an abandoned Japanese building is blowing up on TikTok as part of an online subculture called 'backrooms'

• An edited TikTok video of a robot in an abandoned building has been viewed 22 million times.
• Commenters on the video have linked the footage to an online subculture called the "backrooms."

On March 24, footage supposedly from Google Earth went viral on TikTok, showing what appeared to be a robot with wings inside an abandoned building.

The video — which was captioned, "wtf they hiding in Japan" — now has 22 million views, with many people in the comments saying they were trying to find this hidden room for themselves, using the coordinates that appeared in the TikTok.

However, the footage appears to be edited and is linked to an online community called the "backrooms," where people imagine there are a series of hidden rooms in different dimensions. The video is just one of many linked to this online community, which originated on 4chat and Reddit, but is quietly spreading to TikTok.

It's not possible to replicate the footage by inputting the same coordinates in Google Earth

The viral video — posted by a user called @yeetme084 — zooms in on the country of Japan, then on two circular buildings, before showing what appears to be the inside of one of the buildings, which is largely empty aside from a cubed robot with wings.

Comments on the video were shocked. One comment with 750 likes read, "someone needs to check that place out bro."

When typed into Google Earth, the coordinates from the video take users to the site of the two circular buildings, which are located next to an abandoned Japanese water park called Nara Dreamlands.

However, users can only zoom in up to a certain point, and cannot access the inside of the building using Google Earth. This led to some commenters under the video speculating that the hidden room in the building was likely produced using image or video editing software. The original creator of TikTok did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

The video has been linked to 'backrooms,' an online folklore community dating back to 2018

Some commenters wrote, "backrooms," under the video, appearing to link the video to a larger online community of the same name.

The "backrooms" concept is thought to have originated on the imageboard website 4chan in 2018 or 2019, according to a moderator from a Reddit group about the subculture who did not want to be named for privacy reasons.

The original post showed a room with yellow walls and a bare floor. Many members of the community now describe this as "floor zero" of the backrooms — the most basic level — and the moderator told Insider that the "creepy" image "terrified" people and led them to develop a storyline about secret rooms hidden in the universe.

On TikTok and Reddit, people have posted subsequent images that are meant to belong to other "levels" and "floors" in the backrooms, each with a different ambiance, with some saying that you can "no-clip" into these rooms, which means you can transport into them by passing through the floor like you might be able to do in certain video games.

Reddit forums dedicated to the backrooms have tens of thousands of members, where people often post pictures of abandoned rooms that they say are part of the backrooms, alongside stories written by people claiming to be trapped in these rooms. The moderator told Insider the concept and stories are "entirely fictional."

In yeetme084's TikTok, the cubed robot with wings that can be seen in the room closely resembles a fictional character named "Billy le Robot," who is named and pictured in many posts on subreddits about the backrooms.

The owner of a YouTube channel, who poses as the character of "Billy le Robot," shares coordinates and puzzles with viewers in videos as part of a game to help them find the fictional backrooms. He told Insider the character is meant to be a "traveler" who goes in search of secret rooms in other dimensions.

The 'backrooms' community is now taking off on TikTok

The original creator of the fake Google Earth footage in Japan has posted other similar videos, featuring what appears to be Billy le Robot in Canada and Florida, and have hundreds of thousands of views each.

While the video of the Japanese building is one of the most viral, the "backrooms" are becoming a popular point of discussion on TikTok. The hashtag #backrooms has 2.3 billion views, where people are sharing videos of fictional levels and rooms, and commenters have appeared to become engrossed in the community and folklore, saying they want to find these rooms or have dreamed about them at night.

A Reddit user and member of r/backrooms, who did not want to be named for privacy reasons, told Insider he thinks that the community has become popular on TikTok because the video format allows creators to incorporate "sound design, like the squishing of carpet and humming of fluorescent lights, which greatly adds to the atmosphere" and becomes more immersive.

He added that the appeal of the backrooms for himself and many others is the "uncanniness" and "horror" aspect. "It's like looking out into the vast void of space without knowing what's around the corner," he said.

For more stories like this, check out coverage from Insider's Digital Culture team here.