A tweet, marked with Tide branding and circulated as a screenshot on social media platforms on Thursday, was a hoax, representatives of the world's biggest consumer goods company said.

The tweet read: "We regret to inform you, we will be removing Tide Pods from shelves starting February 1. It's been a good run, but we can't risk lives over having clean clothes.

It followed the circulation of a series of videos of teenagers consuming the brightly coloured detergent sachets and then daring others to do the same "Tide Pod challenge".

"We are not discontinuing Tide Pods," the company said in an emailed statement. "They are used safely by millions of people around the world and we will continue to offer them, in addition to other detergent forms from Tide."

On Tuesday, the company had said it was doing all it could to stop the challenge.

(Reporting by Sangameswaran S and Siddharth Cavale in Bengaluru; editing by Patrick Graham)