Snap Sued Over 'Sextortion' of Kids By Predators (cnbc.com) 41
New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez has filed a lawsuit against Snap, accusing Snapchat of fostering and promoting illicit sexual material involving children, facilitating sextortion, and enabling trafficking of children, drugs, and guns. CNBC reports: The suit alleges that Snap "repeatedly made statements to the public regarding the safety and design of its platforms that it knew were untrue," or that were contradicted by the company's own internal findings. "Snap was specifically aware, but failed to warn children and parents, of 'rampant' and 'massive' sextortion on its platform -- a problem so grave that it drives children facing merciless and relentless blackmail demands or disclosure of intimate images to their families and friends to suicide," the suit says.
New Mexico's Department of Justice, which Torrez leads, in recent months conducted an investigation that found that there was a "vast network of dark web sites dedicated to sharing stolen, non-consensual sexual images from Snap" and that there were more than 10,000 records related to SNAP and child sexual abuse material "in the last year alone," the department said. The suit alleges violations of New Mexico's unfair trade practices law.
New Mexico's Department of Justice, which Torrez leads, in recent months conducted an investigation that found that there was a "vast network of dark web sites dedicated to sharing stolen, non-consensual sexual images from Snap" and that there were more than 10,000 records related to SNAP and child sexual abuse material "in the last year alone," the department said. The suit alleges violations of New Mexico's unfair trade practices law.
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Do they have satellite uplinked cameras in all the vans they sell that can't be removed
Best solution I can think of... (Score:2)
Is to ban anyone that's not legally an adult from accessing the platform. This would make it so only adults are on those platforms and adults are responsible for themselves at that point.
The only other solution is requiring government ID to use the Internet. That sounds about as horrible of an idea as I can think of. No thanks.
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However, absent laws requiring that anyone below an age be restricted from accessing
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But the prosecutors don't want to do that, as it's a lot of actual investigative work against a pseudo-anonymous username that wouldn't turn up much profit.
Especially when compared to just suing the pants off of the well-known company providing the service. (Either you get the company to pay a fine / settlement, or get shutdown by "the gubermint" and have something to campaign on. Either way, suing the company is a guaranteed w
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The only other solution is requiring government ID to use the Internet. That sounds about as horrible of an idea as I can think of. No thanks.
Depending on where you're getting service from, that might already be the case. My cell phone service required ID and a credit check, and my home broadband required an actual visit from a human to make sure I was really the homeowner (it would be kind of annoying if random people could just sign your house up for Spectrum, come to think of it).
I realize there are prepaid cell services and open WiFi hotspots, but the idea of that you have to prove you're an adult to get connected to the internet really isn'
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First of all, Google is complicit in this happening, at least when I looked into it in 2021-2022. The Android operating system tries to prevent you from intercepting Snapchat messages, with making rooting damn near impossible and preventing you from installing your own certificate (for a web filter) on the platform. Apple may be too, I don't know for a fact and didn't have an Apple device to test on.
What is happening though is kids are sending nudes in the first place.
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What is happening though is kids are sending nudes in the first place.
Likely through being catfished. They probably assume they're chatting with someone their age and it turns out there's actually a pedo on the other end of the line.
Of course, sometimes teenagers lie about their age, too. There was a story awhile back of some guy who got arrested because his Grindr hookup was actually underage. I'd believe it, because way back in the day I caught my teenage younger brother with some booze and asked him how he got it. Turns out one of his 16-year-old friends with quite a b
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What is happening though is kids are sending nudes in the first place.
Likely through being catfished. They probably assume they're chatting with someone their age and it turns out there's actually a pedo on the other end of the line.
Of course, sometimes teenagers lie about their age, too. There was a story awhile back of some guy who got arrested because his Grindr hookup was actually underage. I'd believe it, because way back in the day I caught my teenage younger brother with some booze and asked him how he got it. Turns out one of his 16-year-old friends with quite a bit of facial hair and a rather advanced case of male pattern baldness found a liquor store that didn't feel the need to card someone who they believed had to be over 21.
It is likely through being catfished, but an LLM can detect that as well generically without needing to know the age of the person on the other end. Kids should not be sending naked pictures to each other, which would include the 'catfisher.' Are you saying that's okay?
Re: Best solution I can think of... (Score:2)
"Kids should not be sending naked pictures to each other"
Why?
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"Kids should not be sending naked pictures to each other"
Why?
Because it's toxic, but there are a host of other reasons.
1. Legal implications: In many places, sending or receiving explicit images of minors, even if shared voluntarily, is illegal and considered child pornography. This can lead to serious legal consequences, including criminal charges and the potential to be placed on a sex offender registry.
2. Emotional and Psychological Harm: Kids may not fully grasp the emotional impact of sharing such intimate content. Trust can be easily broken, and the person
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If you're old enough to give consent, you should be old enough to send nudes. The ages of both parties involved are a factor when it comes to consent between minors, though. It also complicated things that in the USA the age of consent and so-called "Romeo and Juliet" laws vary considerably from state to state.
Additionally problematic, this whole Snap ordeal points out, is that even if it's okay for a 16-year-old to send nudes to another 16-year-old, those same images leaked onto the internet would then b
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Otherwise, no, see my other comment in response to someone else on this thread, it outlines why in detail and links to government research that has been done regarding it. The truth of the matter is most kids don't want to and get pressured into it and regret it. Not all of them are seasoned veterans and mistakes as a child can haunt you for the rest of your
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Not all of them are seasoned veterans and mistakes as a child can haunt you for the rest of your life. Parents should be actively preventing it and many would, given the opportunity.
There's a whole separate moral and parental responsibility can of worms associated with this, but I'm merely addressing it from the legal angle that in some states, it's perfectly legal for teens as young as 13 to consent to sex with their peers. [wikipedia.org]
It's probably not something you'll ever get everyone to agree on, because some of us do remember being horny little bastards as teens, and I guess others have blocked it out or really never did think about sex until they hit 18. I'll admit, I'm a little biased beca
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What is happening though is kids are sending nudes in the first place. They are actively producing child porn in mass. I have come across A LOT of it on Snap, just by adding everyone that it suggests as a friend.
Sounds like a scam I've heard happens with Instagram models sometimes. If your response to them sending you illegal photos is anything but reporting them (if you send photos back, asking for more, etc.) they tell you to pay up or they'll send screenshots of your chat to the rest of your friends list.
(And no, I don't think it's actually underage people perpetrating the scam. I'd assume they're using material they found in some seedy part of the internet.)
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As i recall from back lo those many decades ago when I was 14, I was a walking erection whishing to insert tab a into any slot a that I could back then... And as I recall, all the slot
At least the post and article don't say CSAM (Score:2)
They actually write the entire term out, which makes them comprehensible.
Re: At least the post and article don't say CSAM (Score:1)
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You'll have that in your search history if you do that...
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Which is like searching for "how to make meth" just to be sure you're not accidentally making meth.
Blame the juicy target.... (Score:3, Interesting)
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Because, as well all know, only one can be held accountable, right? And why do you think it's only about money? Did you read any of it?
But hey, at least we know that CSAM makes you think "juicy target".
How about helping the children? (Score:2, Interesting)
If the USA wasn't so obsessed with making not wearing clothes, a crime, this wouldn't be happening. How about teaching children, they don't need to be ashamed of their sexual organs? (Everybody has one set, so you're not special.) How about teaching teenagers, being desperate is normal but don't do it on unencrypted message services (The lack of encryption is encouraging crime: Who woulda guessed?), and really, really, don't do it with strangers? We've supposedly eliminated slut-shaming, but sex is some
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If the USA wasn't so obsessed with making not wearing clothes, a crime, this wouldn't be happening. How about teaching children, they don't need to be ashamed of their sexual organs? (Everybody has one set, so you're not special.) How about teaching teenagers, being desperate is normal but don't do it on unencrypted message services (The lack of encryption is encouraging crime: Who woulda guessed?), and really, really, don't do it with strangers? We've supposedly eliminated slut-shaming, but sex is something teenagers (and adults) are still taught to handle dishonestly.
I agree. It should not be a problem to see someone else naked. After all, we were born that way. It's the sexualization that makes it a problem. Most nudes are not simply "nudes" but erotic in some form, or they focus on a specific part of their body and are again sexualized by others. I see nothing wrong with a boy/girl streaking on camera having fun, but nudes are not that.
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If the USA wasn't so obsessed with making not wearing clothes, a crime, this wouldn't be happening.
Even in cultures comfortable with nudity, I contend there's a line between, for example, being seen topless at the beach and the sort of intimate images one might share with a romantic partner. Where's the line? I believe that's the famous "I know it when I see it" determination.
How about teaching teenagers, being desperate is normal but don't do it on unencrypted message services
I don't see how the service being encrypted has anything to do with it. The allegation here (gasp - I read the article!) doesn't seem to be that Alice and Bob are exchanging images and Eve somehow intercepts the unencrypted Snaps
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The US government, in a rare moment of caring, wants to prevent female children being treated as "intimate" partners. As you notice, there's no easy way to determine if an image is too intimate so the answer is, ban everything. That, in turn means female children lose their identity and teenagers, their power to act as an adult.
Hence my third paragraph: "... much of that 'theft' is probably wilful sharing ..."
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Humans acting like lower animals (Score:2)
This is why we can't have nice things!
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This is why we can't have nice things!
I know, without Snapchat I don't think I'd be able to sit through a presidential debate. [tmz.com]
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You know., I'm really fucking sick and tired of some humans proving that they're no better than base animals.
I hate to break it to you but we're much, much worse.
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Then they vote for Republicans and that just makes everything so much worse.
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goverment has found there buzzzword to go after all encryption.
This case has nothing to do with Snap being an encrypted messaging service... in fact, I'm pretty sure it's not.
Not the only thing that can hurt children. (Score:2)
"stolen, non-consensual"? (Score:2)
It seems unlikely that a significant amount of the images were non-consensual and then stolen.
Presumably the majority of images are consensual sext images gained through shared password hacks.
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It's probably the usual case of parents being in the dark and believing that their teenager is an absolute angel who would never do something like that. Hell, I think Reddit would lose half its userbase if parents actually paid attention to what kinds of weird shit their kids get into to on the internet.
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Platfroms Need to Be Ran Responsibly (Score:2)
I have talked with people have and offer online emotional support to adults who have been hurt has children; none of the people I talked to has said that they ave had a full recovery from having been hurt as a child, me neither.
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