Kiwi Bank introduced Buck in June with an ad campaign designed to encourage customers to stop “following the flock”.

However, Buck quickly drew a different type of attention, with internet users deeming the green-coloured sheep too attractive.

The bank initially responded to the memes with copyright takedown requests, but this caused interest in the character to snowball – she even made an appearance on John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight. CTV reports one social media user as saying: “What if we ALL say the kiwibank sheep is sexy. They can’t get us all.”

The situation has now culminated in New Zealand’s Free Speech Union accusing the company of censorship.

Its open letter reads: “Kiwibank is entitled to enforce its copyright, but not to use it as a content filter … Using copyright to remove speech a company dislikes is censorship, even when the subject is a sheep.”