TechKnow: Dangerous web

Social media platforms may be used as tool by predators, facilitate sexual assault in kids: Study

Social media platforms like Instagram and Snapchat offer benefits for teens but also can be used as a tool by predators online as about 7 per cent of more than 1,000 teens who disclosed sexual abuse reported that social media was used to facilitate the assault, a new study said on Friday.

The research, presented during the American Academy of Pediatrics 2024 National Conference & Exhibition, found that, when accounting only for victims whose perpetrators were not related to them, an even higher percentage – 12 per cent -- reported that social media facilitated sexual assault.

The team evaluated children 10 to 18 years of age who disclosed sexual abuse at Rady Children’s Hospital Chadwick Center for Children and Families between 2018 and 2023.

They defined “social media facilitated sexual assault” as occurring when social media is used for communication between a victim and perpetrator that leads to sexual assault.

Miguel Cano, a child abuse paediatrician and author of the research, said that adolescents are increasingly living their lives in digital spaces.

“Although there are benefits to the use of social media such as connecting with people and keeping in touch with family and friends across the globe, there are many well documented dangers as well,” Cano added.

According to the study, dangers include meeting strangers online or being subjected to various forms of maltreatment including emotional abuse, cyber bullying, harassment, threats, exposure to sexual content, and being victims of online sexual abuse.

Instagram and Snapchat were the two most commonly reported social media platforms used. However, multiple platforms were reported.

With few oversights and regulations, parents, paediatricians and anyone who cares for children need to understand this danger and need better tools and resources to help keep children safe from predators on social media, Cano stressed.

Meta slapped with fine for 2019 security lapse
Meta was punished Friday with a fine worth more than $100 million from the social media giant’s European Union privacy regulator over a security lapse involving passwords for Facebook users.
The Irish Data Protection Commission said it slapped the U.S. tech company with the 91 million euro ($101.6 million) penalty following an investigation.
The watchdog started investigating in 2019 after it was notified by Meta that some passwords had been inadvertently stored internally in plain text, which means they weren’t encrypted and it was possible for employees to search for them.
Deputy Commissioner Graham Doyle said it’s “widely accepted” that user passwords should not be stored in plain text, “considering the risks of abuse.”
Meta said a security review found that a “subset” of Face­book users’ passwords were “temporarily logged in a readable format.”
“We took immediate action to fix this error, and there is no evidence that these passwords were abused or accessed improperly,” the company said in a statement. “We proactively flagged this issue to our lead regulator, the Irish Data Protection Commission, and have engaged constructively with them throughout this inquiry.”
It’s the latest in a series of hefty fines for Meta and its social media platforms from the Dublin-based watchdog, which is the company’s lead regulator under the 27-nation EU’s stringent data privacy rulebook.

They include a 405 million euro fine for Instagram over mishandling teen data, a 5.5 million euro penalty involving WhatsApp and a 1.2 billion euro fine for Meta over transatlantic data transfers.