Habbo caught up in child sex scandal / Habbo Mute

[GommeInc]

But wouldn't it help the cybering thing, even a tiny bit?

All the credits are terrible value for money. LOL!

Depends if they want to sink back into the past. Also, back when the filter was a permanent fixture, people would cyber-sex each other (four letter S word is filtered ) using creative language. Moderation (incl. moderators) needs to be smart. At the moment they're like the blind and deaf child sitter you get because they are cheap. They cannot hear or see what is going on around them and just let it go on by.

[scottish]

Needing to prove that users are 18 is just even more effort, and with habbos past with databases being leaked would you want them to hold information on your ID (driving license scan, etc)?

I sure as hell wouldn't.

How would they catch the people who are faking their age?

[lawrawrrr]

The only problem with the OLD MEN WANT TO RAPE YOU stance is that eventually this will lead to the believe that everyone not a kid/teen online is a pedophile and will cause an even larger gap in any mixed age community, even things such as this forum. Obviously we all know each other here and I'm sure our younger members feel safe but just imagine if you had been taught from a young age that older people online are all shady and you find a forum like this where the age demo is roughly half teens/ half young adults would you be willing to sign up?

Obviously the route you're suggesting would be the safest route but we must learn to differentiate between someone like myself or Neversoft (I think he's over 18 anyway) or flyingjesus who are over 18 but use these spots to converse with a multitude of ages because we grew up using them and someone who is using something such as Habbo for dodgy reasons.

I think that the 'everyone not a kid/teen is a paedo' stance is not necessarily a bad thing - it teaches children to be wary of anyone.

Hey i'm over 18! I'm not saying that it's right to accuse anyone, but I was talking to a 20 year old yesterday, I was wary of him and after a while he ended up asking for naked pictures. I know I'm technically an adult, but he could have contacted me when I was still a younger teenager.

[Smurfed-]

oh dear Lord, GAME and WHSmith pulled out as well?

Going well. I really wanna go see if this is in any newspaper irl (minus the telegraph or dailymail 'cause I think we've been told about that)

I was in WHSmith and Tesco today and the cards were still there. I was also looking through the newspapers and the story is in more newspapers then I would have thought.

[MKR&*42]

I was in WHSmith and Tesco today and the cards were still there. I was also looking through the newspapers and the story is in more newspapers then I would have thought.

I'd imagine it'd take a few days until all the cards were completely gone . Hi though Alex x

[lawrawrrr]

I'm sure I saw something a while ago on TV that suggested swearing can help in 1 way because it vents anger verbally as opposed to someone physically hurting another person. Of course, that can't actually happen on the hotel (physical) but it certainly provides a small piece of logic for why people curse. You won't be able to stop teens being introduced to swearing, and quite often it occurs at a lot younger age now - think I first started when I was 8 lol because I got it from my mum and stepdad who both had an awful temper.

True, but tbh it just shows a lack of vocabulary. In my area, hardly anyone ever swears, and the less fortunate (for example some of the Jeremy Kyle cases) can't even get a sentence out without a curse of some form.

Depends if they want to sink back into the past. Also, back when the filter was a permanent fixture, people would cyber-sex each other (four letter S word is filtered ) using creative language. Moderation (incl. moderators) needs to be smart. At the moment they're like the blind and deaf child sitter you get because they are cheap. They cannot hear or see what is going on around them and just let it go on by.

Again, a good point. When I was younger (during the bobba filter era), I did venture into cybering, not going to lie, because I was intrigued, but I got fed up ahving to type out words. Even if there was a full staff of capable mods, they couldn't check EVERY chat log for sexual references, they have 'trigger' words already, which I just think they actually need to act on.

If they are all singaporean, or soon to be costa rican, does that mean at certain times there's no mods (say 4am costa rica time) which is peak GMT time?

Needing to prove that users are 18 is just even more effort, and with habbos past with databases being leaked would you want them to hold information on your ID (driving license scan, etc)?

I sure as hell wouldn't.

How would they catch the people who are faking their age?

They couldn't, that's the problem. I'm trying to think of another way they could do this...

Children jsut don't understand how illegal it is to fake your age...

[GommeInc]

I think that the 'everyone not a kid/teen is a paedo' stance is not necessarily a bad thing - it teaches children to be wary of anyone.

Hey i'm over 18! I'm not saying that it's right to accuse anyone, but I was talking to a 20 year old yesterday, I was wary of him and after a while he ended up asking for naked pictures. I know I'm technically an adult, but he could have contacted me when I was still a younger teenager.

Would it not be better just to teach children not to give complete strangers naked pictures of yourself or follow them in to dark alleyways? Some strangers have helped children in the past. A few times at my school a stranger reported into the office saying they think a child was being bullied after seeing them run off crying and asking them what's wrong. It's more wary of where conversations and actions may lead, rather than a fear of old men in general

[Niall!]

I think that the 'everyone not a kid/teen is a paedo' stance is not necessarily a bad thing - it teaches children to be wary of anyone.

Hey i'm over 18! I'm not saying that it's right to accuse anyone, but I was talking to a 20 year old yesterday, I was wary of him and after a while he ended up asking for naked pictures. I know I'm technically an adult, but he could have contacted me when I was still a younger teenager.

But that's exactly the kind of slippery slope we should be worried about. First of all, you can't have people living in fear. Second, eventually this would slip over in to real life, leaving some kids/teens with a huge paranoia at all times or an extreme fear of adults out on the street which, while useful, WILL destroy their lives. What you're promoting is the "trust nobody, only yourself" way of thinking and let me tell you from experience, that makes you miserable.

You have no right to call the 20 year old a potential pedophile. You are 18, a legal adult and any nude picture of yourself is considered legal in the eyes of the British government. What you are basically saying is that someone could potentially molest a child because they have sex with 18-19 year olds which is absolutely ridiculous, especially if the guy is only 20 years of age. Do you understand what I'm trying to say now?

[GommeInc]

I wonder if they will make it so users can't make free rooms anymore unless they buy furniture... It seems like an idea that could work, but it's a solution that would be too late considering how many of these rooms probably belong to people completely oblivious to what's going on.

[Wyked]

I can definitely see a situation here where the hotel remains muted until a very strict chat filter has been put in place, no option of turning it off, and a dramatic increase in active moderation, at least for the time being until all of the media attention dies down.