Twitch CEO Dan Clancy has addressed last weekend's public assault of prolific streamer Emiru, saying he is "looking very closely at everything that happened there" and insisting creator safety is his "top priority."
At TwitchCon 2025, Emiru was assaulted by a man who crossed multiple barriers in San Diego Convention Center to grab the 27-year-old streamer and cosplayer's face and forcibly kiss her during a meet and greet. Emiru, real name Emily-Beth Schunk, has since urged fellow creators to "seriously consider not attending" future TwitchCon events, and confirmed she was pressing charges against the assailant. A viral video caught the interaction.
Emiru was shocked not only that the man was able to reach her without Twitch security intervening, but also disappointed in both Twitch's support of her immediately after the incident, and its statement that it quickly intervened and removed the assailant, which she called "a blatant lie."
Now, in an interview with journalist Taylor Lorenz, Clancy reflected on safety for creators and fans susceptible to parasocial relationships, saying: "The safety of our creators is our top priority. The challenge we face is a challenge in today’s society. It’s not limited to Twitch, it extends throughout our society.
"I do think that when you’re livestreaming, in many ways, since you control your community and you can ban people, you can make it so that those people that you don’t want engaging with you and participating with you, aren’t there," he added. "When I use other short-form content and people say all sorts of stuff, well I can't stop that. But when I livestream, they basically don't bother me.
"Now, what happened yesterday, obviously, was something that we care deeply about securing this environment. We’re looking very closely at everything that happened there, and I care deeply about Emi. She’s a friend of mine, and so I want to see how we can support her. This is just something we have to keep working on. I think everyone identifies our tools in terms of trust and safety as the leaders in the industry about helping creators, but that means there's always more work to be done, because that's the world we live in now."
Asked why streamers should continue to trust Twitch to keep them safe at TwitchCon after such a high-profile security breach, Clancy responded: "The reality is even as you do a lot in terms of security in today's world, there are challenges that can present themselves, especially when someone is putting themselves out there, right?
"And so, we try to work very closely with each creator about what they want to do, and what works for them. I don't want to get into any, you know, specifics or details, but part of that is working with creators. Right now, we're definitely ramping it up to make sure creators know that we have the resources there to help them figure out what's right for them."
Emiru has not responded to Clancy's comments, but in a livestream shortly after the assault, she described what had happened.
"I see out of the corner of my eye, there's a guy walking around the side of the Meet and Greet and he crosses in front of the Meet and Greet of the person to the left of me, which is a VTuber. So he's able to walk up and in front of another streamer's Meet and Greet, and then he walks up to me and he's walking with a purpose, you know what I mean? And then he leans in like he's going to tell me something, so maybe it's like he's TwitchCon staff or something, but I'm freaked out because he grabbed me. That's not normal. And then he grabs my face, and he leans in, lips puckered, and tries to kiss me and I start screaming. You can't hear it in the clip, but I'm f***ing screaming my head off.
"Twitch security is nowhere near me. I can see them, but they don't do anything. My security jumps up and shoves the guy away from me, and he's allowed to walk away and leave. No one in Twitch staff came up to me to see what was going on."
Feeling as though she "could have literally been stabbed" and revealing the "global head of Amazon" flew out to TwitchCon to speak to her manager and security, Emiru has confirmed she is pressing charges against the assailant, adding: "As for anything else, I don't know yet, because I've been having my manager handle all of those side conversations. So I have no idea, but this is just not okay."
Photo by Denise Truscello/Getty Images for Amazon's Crown Channel.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
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