DREAM / The Prime Minister resigns and wakes up under the Parisian bridge!

 Kliko këtu për të tjera
Voxpress:

How 15-year-olds are being sexually exploited on TikTok

2022-04-27 17:15:59Fokus SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX

How 15-year-olds are being sexually exploited on TikTok

An investigation by Forbes magazine of hundreds of live broadcasts on TikTok reveals how users regularly use the comments section to encourage young girls to perform acts that appear to be on the child pornography line, luring them with gifts or money on Venmo platforms, PayPal or Cash App that users list on their TikTok profiles.

"It's the digital equivalent of going to the strip club filled with 15-year-olds," says Leah Plunkett, an assistant dean at Harvard Law School and faculty associate at Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, focused on young people and media.

Imagine a local, putting a group of minors on a stage in front of a live adult audience that is actively giving them money to perform whatever activity they're looking for. "This is sexual exploitation. That's exactly what TikTok is doing here."

Transactions are happening in an online public forum open to viewers almost everywhere on the planet. Some of the demands are clear, such as requiring girls to kiss each other, open their feet, or turn on the camera and some harder to detect, disguised as euphemias among the comments.

Commentators say "dress control" to get a full view of a girl's body; "pedikyr control" to see their feet; "There is a spider on your wall" to make the girls come back and show their backs. And full of other keywords to encourage girls to flirt with each other.

Phrases such as "raise your hands up" or "touch the ceiling" often address girls dressed in the upper part so that viewers can see their breasts. Many simply force girls to show their tongue and navel. In return, the girls are filled with virtual gifts, which can be converted into money.

U.S. TikTok users are supposed to be at least 18 years old to send, or receive gifts through Live that can be turned into money, and those under 16 must be blocked from hosting live broadcasts, according to company rules.

"TikTok has strong policies and measures to help protect the safety and well-being of teenagers," a company spokesman said. These include placing accounts under the age of 16 in "private" as a pre-election and restricting them from using direct messages. "We immediately revoke access if we find accounts that do not meet our age requirements."

The company said in an email that it also removes content containing sexual activity, or attempts to promote, and that there is a zero tolerance policy for child sexual abuse materials. Some of the accounts that held live broadcasts seen by Forbes were no longer active a few weeks later.

Concerns by the U.S. government and regulators about youth-focused applications like TikTok are intensifying. In his March speech, President Joe Biden called on Washington to "hold social media platforms accountable for experiments they are conducting with for-profit children." And while TikTok has been spared the worst reviews that have fallen on Meta, once Facebook, the Chinese-owned video app has begun to draw more attention to the risks experts say poses to minors.

In March, a two-party group of attorneys general in the US launched an investigation into TikTok's alleged injuries to underage users, and according to the Financial Times, the Department of Homeland Security is investigating the contents. A TikTok spokesman said "they appreciate that state attorneys general are focusing on the safety of younger users" and the company is cooperating. But TikTok was unaware of the Homeland Security investigation.

In the wake of a congressional investigation into how Meta and Instagram could harm children and teenagers, an investigation sparked by revelations by a Meta beacon last fall, lawmakers in October first got a TikTok executive to testify about its policies on underage users.

But, more than six months since then, Congress has made little progress on its pledge to renew children's outdated online privacy laws.

Forbes Source - Translated Voxnews.al


Në përputhje me standarded JTI

Video

SHIKO KANALIN NE YOUTUBE
×