Mom Goes Undercover as 11-Year-Old
Sexual abuse is taking place in homes the world over, but it’s happening when our kids are online. Even though the predator may be in a different state or country, the abuse is happening in subtle but powerful ways that have the power to impact an entire generation of vulnerable young people.
A team at Bark (an online monitoring software that helps parents as they strive to protect their kids) wanted to see just how prevalent the online abuse was. So they used photoshop to alter the images of a 37 year old staff member to create online personas as “bait.” I’ve read up on this project before, but this short video captures some of what they discovered.
A few things worth noting as you watch the video:
The social media apps that predators reached out to the “profiles” were common apps used by our kids: Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok.
The team created profiles for multiple aged girls, but the ones featured here are 15 and 11. It seems that the 11 year old got just as much attention from predators as the 15 year old.
It was astounding how quickly predators reached out. In one case, a girl’s profile was contacted numerous times within minutes of making it public. She also got an unsolicited video call from a pedophile within 5 minutes.
The profiles they created were cute and playfully sexy, but not explicitly so. But be aware that our kids’ posts online can be taken as “sexual teasing” by the wrong people. Just be mindful.
The predators were immediately graphic in their language and manipulative in their requests.
By and large, parents have no idea that this type of thing can happen.
Just watch the video. But be forewarned, it is truly troubling stuff. But you need to see it. If you’re a parent, you need to know this happens all the time.
An observation for every parent:
I’m not advocating that we disengage our kids totally from technology or social media (not a bad idea), but videos like this should serve as a wake-up call for parents. This type of thing can happen and it can happen to any of our kids.
Have conversations about online safety often. Realize that there are evil people in our world and they will do anything they can to take advantage of the weak and vulnerable. Wake up and don’t let it happen on your watch. Talk about it. Get equipped and informed. Let us know how we can help!
