Tourists run through Angkor Wat to recreate a video game for TikTok videos

“It's not just about potential damage to the stones from people bumping into them and falling or knocking things over – which is certainly possible,” heritage consultant Simon Warrack told Bloomberg, “but it's also about damage to the spiritual and cultural value of the temples.”

“Tourists have been doing stupid things in Angkor for years,” Alison Carter, an archaeology professor specializing in Southeast Asia at the University of Oregon, told Business Insider by email – although she noted that she was unfamiliar with the recent virus wave.

In April, for example, authorities claimed that YouTubers were mistreating monkeys at the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Angkor.

“People often forget that Angkor Wat and other Angkor temples are places of living cultural heritage for the Cambodian people,” Carter said. “If you wouldn't do something in a church or mosque, you shouldn't do it in an Angkor temple.”

Andy Brouwer, a film producer and research consultant in the region, agreed.

“I can't believe the temple authorities didn't put an immediate stop to this,” Brouwer told BI, adding: “Having brain-dead idiots running around the temple and jumping up and down is an accident and a disaster waiting to happen.”

However, not everyone is against it. Bloomberg reports that some Cambodians have said on social media that a potential trend could be a boon for tourism, which has declined in the wake of COVID.

Neither the Cambodian Ministry of Tourism nor ASPARA, the national agency responsible for protecting the archaeological site, immediately responded to BI's requests for comment.