- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
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Parents fault, not the site.
Parents don’t know DNS…
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I don’t intend to victim blame or defend any abusers here; this shit is vile and should not be tolerated, period.
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From the below, it sounds like it was determined that, despite Omegle’s moderation efforts, Omegle could have done better in areas relating to age verification and matchmaking. So I’m not trying to defend or minimize Omegle’s role either, I don’t know the details of how the site worked but it sounds like this was a problem for a long time:
the judge in A.M.’s case found last July that Omegle’s design was at fault and it was not protected by Section 230: It could have worked to prevent matches between minors and adults before sexual content was even sent, the judge said.
- However, I really don’t like the choice of phrasing “forced”, and I wonder whether that’s poor paraphrasing or actually taken from the lawsuit.
Her lawsuit, filed in 2021, alleged that she met a man in his thirties on Omegle who forced her to take naked photos and videos over a three-year period. She was just 11 when it began in 2014.
Again, to be clear, not trying to say that the victim should, or even could, have done anything differently. Victim blaming is bad. But how the hell are they saying “forced” to do something by some scumbag over the internet? What kind of conditions does a kid have to be in at home to feel like they can’t turn to their parent/guardian for help in a terrifying situation like that? How is an 11-year-old in 2014 being allowed to get into that situation in the first place, between her parents and her school?
It seems like this victim was failed by every support system she should have been able to rely on. This is so messed up. This is exactly why we need things like sex education and Internet safety education.
This is a failure of parenting. WTF is an 11 year old doing on Omegle?
It just isn’t that simple. I’ve got four kids. At least one of them ended up watching a naked man on Omegle once. And I say this because they were in a group of friends and dared each other on, on a school trip, and they were discovered (one of them felt pretty shocked and told a teacher) and we had a big discussion with her.
Kids do dumb shit all the time. Omegle is (was) very much known about amongst them all.
So, even with careful parenting and a locked down internet, and policies not to have phones upstairs in your room, kids do dumb shit or find a new service that isn’t in your filter, because they’ve heard about it through their friends. I know because my wife and I carefully raise four kids and the internet is a fucking onslaught to a dopamine dependent, approval seeking teenager.
I’m not saying “it’s all Omegle’s fault”. Everyone had a role to play. But let’s not pretend Omegle was blameless.
It’s almost like we should focus on educating them about how to responsibly use the Internet instead of trying to censor their access to it (which as you pointed out, basically never works).
Does anyone actually think shutting down one specific website will make a meaningful difference? Like… really? Did shutting down Napster stop piracy? Did shutting down Silk Road stop online drug sales?
But how the hell are they saying “forced” to do something by some scumbag over the internet?
There was a group from Brazil doing stuff like that and got publicized when they were arrested recently. Usually they’d coerce the minor into sending one picture, then use it as blackmail against them to give them more. They might even gaslight them to convince them that they’ll get in big trouble if they tell anyone and it’ll just get worse for them.
I’ve seen full fledged adults taken hard by scammers and willingly giving them thousands of dollars against their own interests, and they heavily distrust and resist anyone trying to help them. I can only imagine accomplishing that with a child that lacks long term thinking skills is even more effective.
Literally a black mirror episode
Chat Roulette, the site Omegle copied the video format from, had a built in report option that would ban nude people.
So have you heard of emotional violence or exploitation? That’s how that works over the internet. You don’t need to be in the same room to be forced to do something if you’re vulnerable.
God, this entire comment section is nothing but
“I’m not victim blaming, but…”
“personal responsibility”
“parents should be doing blah blah blah…no, I don’t have kids.”
The best parents in the world still can’t control what their kids are doing every second of every day. Kids will always find ways around every single thing that’s meant to restrict what they can do, see, or hear. I’m sure you never did stuff you weren’t supposed to when you were a kid…right?
Yeah, and we could shut down the Internet all together… or we could be realistic about prevention.
And yes, I accessed lots of ‘sensitive’ material online as a kid well before this website existed. So I find it hard to blame this specific website…websites come and go. I do however absolutely blame the creep himself since they are the one who did something wrong. Not the website.
Thank you for adding just another reason for the myriad of pre-existing ones that convinced me of never having kids.
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I’m honestly surprised it took this long
In 2022, there were 608,601 reports of child exploitation on Omegle to the nonprofit National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline. Of all the sites the center tracked, only Facebook, Google, Instagram, and WhatsApp ranked higher.
That’s a crazy high number. Especially for a live content platform which I assume can only ever have individual reports of live interactions?
I wondering how much time will pass for other Omegle emerge? I mean something will fill the gap if there is business you know.
When I was a kid I dialed random numbers and made prank calls to strangers I didn’t know.
Autoplaying unrelated videos. Shit wasteful website.
Sad to see internet getting regulated. At this pace there would be requirements to link all accounts , everything with government identification documents. Oh its already happening slowly…
Next thing you know there is no more partial anonymous sites and no one can do it without major legal challenges.
Everyone jokes about all the wild shit that happened on Omegle, but all that shit was never ‘ok’.
Itt: sad and angry millennials who want to see an endless barrage of men jacking off
That’s nuts! I thought that Omegle was text only. I had no idea that they paired you with people on video. WTF thought that was a good idea?!?
Disgusting that the shutdown note tried to play off their serious issues with grooming and sexual abuse and claim they did a lot. Fuck that asshole.
Edit: Uh oh I’m being downvoted by his fan boys. The article (and successful lawsuit) say’s exactly what I’m saying and anyone who at scale enables mass sexual abuse of children is an asshole. Omegle had no other uses for most of its existence, hypotheticals sure but as the article mentions in practice it was overwhelmingly full of naked men trying to find women and children to interact with sexually. The site runner was flagrantly negligent.
Gosh I love certain types, you’ll rightly jump on a pastor who looked the other way for sexual abuse happening in his church as being responsible, yet a guy who runs a big website for years full of abuse is taken at his word as a sweet, innocent, helpless, benevolent advocate for a better web because he talks right. (Never mind he deliberately obfuscated the horrors happening on his website with his closing statement which people here ate up. It takes a lot to lose safe harbor)
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The design of the website clearly had serious issues. As example, the matchmaking should have been massively reworked.
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They can’t account for people lying about their age. She started using the platform at 11. I’d be curious to know what profile info she did enter, and what age that displayed her as.
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As a child, ultimately her parents are responsible. They should be held accountable for putting their child in danger.
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The groomer was a predator, same as if lurking on the playground. They must be charged to the maximum possible.
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I’m really confused am I supposed to have heard of this website apparently everybody haves been using it for over a decade and I feel like I’m from a parallel universe. What the hell is this website?
