The safest social media platforms for children

The safest social media platforms for children
Fr. Shay Cullen 
8 March 2024 

This is a report in the defense of children. It calls on all the good people that read it to respond with a strong commitment to do good, protect children from abuse, and bring them healing and a chance for a life free from abuse and exploitation. That is the duty of every human being, but not every person has the compassion, empathy, moral strength and the conviction that caring for the abused and exploited children will one day crush the head of the serpent and win the moral battle for the minds, hearts, spirits and lives of all the children in our communities.

The evil serpent turning innocent children into fearful, intimidated and controlled persons is the runaway, uncontrolled and wild internet platforms like Facebook, TikTok and many others. They, through neglect, allow the evil content that damages and infects the minds and hearts of children. The uploaded images and grooming on-line lures the children to unknowingly participate in actions harmful to them. They are caught in irreversible situations that can lead them to take their own lives.

Everyone must know that there are alternatives to Facebook and we ought to direct children to safe and secure social media platforms like Kidzworld, Cocoon, PX Kd, and Zigazoo. Good got kids age 5 and older, a very creative platform. Azoomee provides kids with games and videos. Then, there is Kinzoo Messenger for Families.  Yet another is Blinx,  great for children aged eight and older. Also, GeckoLife and the website Franktown Rocks.

Adults that want a safe and cleaner alternative can transfer to other platforms and persuade their friends and contacts to join them and change to Masodom or Ownmates. Also Signal and Telegraph are safer platforms and an alternative to Facebook for communicating.

Many people find child abuse too shocking to read or think about, let alone form a determination to act for the good and oppose evil. That’s because there are so many millions of child abuse victims that are now adults that live with repressed memories. They turn away from the thoughts and memories of the evil crime from which they continue to suffer from. The memory of childhood sexual abuse cannot be totally erased. Victims, although already adults, could heal if they fought back, joined campaigns against this evil and saved other victims. Failure to act allows more crimes and abuse to continue. 

Others ignore the evil done to children and continue to use Facebook and other harmful sites. Thousands of children are abused in the Philippines according to UNICEF research on these sites. 

The platform can be used for good, too. Everyone with knowledge of good and evil and a conscience must control and limit their use to essential contact and advise and persuade their friends to transfer to a cleaner, more morally correct platform. 

Every person concerned in safeguarding children should invite friends to join a petition to their governments and make a campaign to appeal to the public, hold a rally however small at first, and demand international action in the EU and the United States for laws imposing stringent control of social media platforms and supporting changes to Section 230 of the US Communications Decency Act of 1996.

This law makes social platforms immune from being sued for any information that others may post there. Because of this law, they are not legally responsible but they are morally responsible. The platforms like Facebook allegedly have no conscience or interest to control or moderate the evil and corrupting content. They hide behind and are protected by Section 230 of the US Communications Decency Act. This must be changed. The people to be held responsible under the law in most countries are the persons that post the illegal material and those who access it. 

The internet network connecting everybody with an account and the ISPs that use it and enable it to function have weak, ineffective or no blocking software installed and that allows the evil content and abusers to proliferate and spread. Powerful software is available to stop many images of child abuse but the telecommunication companies despite their billions of profits don’t use them. It is likely the software will slow down their systems and they might lose customers to other providers.

Philippine law says the ISPs should install blocking software (RA 11930). It seems they choose to ignore the law. It says, under Section 3(e), the telecommunications/ICT regulator, which is the National Telecommunications Commission, ……. under Section 9(a), has the authority to order internet intermediaries to immediately block access to, remove or take down the internet address, uniform resource locator (URL), websites, or any content thereof containing CSAEM (child sexual abuse and exploitation material) or involving streaming or live streaming of OSAEC (online sexual abuse and exploitation of children). The ISPs and telecoms seem to care more about making money than child safety. 

In a comprehensive study, Unicef researchers discovered that one in every five Filipino children between the ages of 12 years old and 17 said that they were sexually abused online over the internet. It was established that 90 percent of the 950 children contacted and interviewed said that they were using Facebook and Facebook Messenger. The UNICEF research was done between January and April 2021. It also said that children reported the abused they experienced began through other sites like TikTok, Twitter,(now X) Instagram and Snapchat. 

The female children were lured by a “boyfriend” to expose themselves on-line. They were recorded and blackmailed to pay not to have their compromising photos and videos sent to their family and classmates. 

Others suffered when their private personal photos were circulated on Facebook without their permission. Many children worldwide have committed suicide because of sexploitation blackmail. The 15-year-old teenager allegedly raped and sexually assaulted by a priest in Cagayan, now in jail and on trial, was blackmailed to having sex with him. He admitted the criminal acts but claimed they were consensual. However, he videoed the acts and blackmailed the child to have sex with him. Eventually, she broke down and told her friends what he was doing to her. 

Other children reported to UNICEF being sexually abused by Facebook contacts. They were ashamed or afraid to report the abuse. They continue to suffer in silence and bury the hurt and pain inside. All must work together to get the government to implement the law and control the evil content passing through the ISPs for the protection of the children and society. 

www.preda.org