Parents in North Carolina got a shock on Tuesday when clips for the adult Playboy station suddenly appeared on two major children's networks.
Instead of previews for a range of children's programmes, astonished viewers found they were replaced with naked women having sexually explicit conversations.
A spokesman for Time Warner Cable who run the channels issued an apology, adding, "It was a technical glitch and unfortunately it hit at the worst possible time on the worst possible channels."
The mistake occurred on the Kids On Demand and Kids Preschool On Demand channels from 6.15 in the morning.
Despite being flooded with calls from shocked parents, the fault took two hours to correct.
"We're very, very sorry it happened - we know parents are concerned," said TWC spokesman Keith Poston adding, "I have a 9-year-old. I'm a dad. I'd be concerned too."
The error only affected a small area which is why it had failed to be picked up by the usual safeguards, and TWC have promised that it will never happen again.
Do you think this is just an innocent mistake, or could children have been harmed by accidently seeing such images?