Microsoft’s internet service MSN is closing all its chatrooms in Europe, the Middle East, Latin America and most of Asia from October 14 in a step towards protecting young web users from paedophiles.
Advertisement
It was recently reported on Microsoft's website that one in five children between the ages of nine and 16 regularly use chatrooms and that more than two out of 10 of these children have engaged in conversations of a sexual nature.
A quarter of these children have reportedly received requests to meet face-to-face and one in 10 have actually met their online "friends".
US study points to similar findings
Nearly one in five children who go online say they've received at least one unwanted sexual advance in cyberspace, a fairly recent study conducted by the University of New Hampshire in the US showed.
And girls, particularly those between the ages of 14 and 17, are more likely than boys and younger children to report an unwanted advance, according to this research.
Three-quarters of the children who experienced an unwanted advance shrugged the incident off. However, 25 percent, and especially the younger kids, said they were "very or extremely upset or afraid," Kimberly Mitchell, a researcher at the Crimes Against Children Research Centre at the University of New Hampshire in Durham told HealthScoutNews.
A clever marketing trick?
But, according to The Natal Witness Microsoft's move is a marketing trick intended to "shunt customers to paid services across the network". This South African newspaper reports that the MSN chat feature will still be available to customers in the US, Japan, Brazil and Canada. The only snag – users must provide their credit card numbers to use the facility.
By claiming to be "protecting the public", Microsoft is passing the buck on combating paedophiles and pornography, Ananzi MD Mark Buwelda told The Natal Witness. "It probably wants to escape legal action by people who have been abused on their sites." – (Health24)
Bookmark with:
What are social bookmarks?