U.K. Retailers Drop Habbo Cards

[Andy Chalk]

U.K. Retailers Drop Habbo Cards

A report on rampant pedophile activity has led to further backlash against the popular kids' MMO Habbo.

U.K.-based Channel 4 aired its exposé [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/117875-Report-Labels-Habbo-a-Pedophile-Haven] of pedophiles on Habbo, a social network/MMO that caters to young teens that's been in operation since 2000. It's a popular site, drawing in excess of nine million unique users per month, but it also has, not without reason, a reputation as the sort of place that pedophiles might take an interest in. The prevalence of pedo activity suggested by last night's report, however, was still surprising.

"Within two minutes I was being asked individually 'Do you have a webcam?', 'Can we chat on [instant messenger service] MSN, on Skype?'," said producer Rachel Seifert, who claimed that she was approached for sexually explicit chat and interactions during each of her 50 visits to the game over two months. "I was also, within a couple of minutes, asked to strip, fully naked, and asked what would I do on a webcam."

The report cost Habbo developer Sulake its second-largest investor, Balderton Capital, which revealed its intention to sell its 13 percent stake in the company and resigned from the board of directors even before the show aired, but now retailers are stepping back from the game as well. Tesco, WH Smith and Game have all stopped selling prepaid Habbo cards. How much of an impact that will actually have on Habbo's bottom line is debatable, as only about 300,000 of its users are based in the U.K. and not all of them would use the cards, but it still reflects very poorly on the game.

"We were concerned to learn of Habbo Hotel allegations made in the C4 report," a WH Smith rep said. "We have taken this product off sale, pending further investigation."

Not everyone is thrilled with Channel 4's work, however, including at least some of the game's users. One of them said on Twitter than the show "just ruined a day for more than two million people," while another one asked, "What do pedos and your news reporters have in common? They both pretend to be little girls on the internet. Dumbass."

Source: The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/jun/13/high-street-retailers-habbo-hotel-channel-4]


Permalink

 

[hazabaza1]

Habbo still exists?
Christ, I was on that when I was like, 10.

 

[Scarim Coral]

So let get this straight, to those users who are annoyed with Channel 4, do they want to be harass by the pedos at the expense of playing it? However in saying so if they choice to shut it down the pedos will simple go elsewhere.

 

[Your Fearless Captain]

And nothing of value was lost.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

So let get this straight, to those users who are annoyed with Channel 4, do they want to be harass by the pedos at the expense of playing it? However in saying so if they choice to shut it down the pedos will simple go elsewhere.

It could be that the people annoyed by Channel 4 are the pedos and perverts who beg to cam/skype with the players. I've never used Habbo but...this kind of news doesn't really surprise me. I wonder how many of these same pervs/pedos are also on the cartoon network MMO thing and other kids games.

 

[Brad Shepard]

And nothing of value was lost.

Your avatar is perfect for what you just said.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

So let get this straight, to those users who are annoyed with Channel 4, do they want to be harass by the pedos at the expense of playing it? However in saying so if they choice to shut it down the pedos will simple go elsewhere.

Well maybe they're annoyed because C4's 'investigation' had a lot of gaping holes in it, and was pretty much just scare-mongering for the sake of ratings/traffic. Which appears to have worked.

 

[Lopunny]

So let get this straight, to those users who are annoyed with Channel 4, do they want to be harass by the pedos at the expense of playing it? However in saying so if they choice to shut it down the pedos will simple go elsewhere.

Well maybe they're annoyed because C4's 'investigation' had a lot of gaping holes in it, and was pretty much just scare-mongering for the sake of ratings/traffic. Which appears to have worked.

I'll be honest, myself and a friend immediately created an account after watching the report (we're in the UK). Posing as a 12 year old girl, we were chatted up within 10 minutes by a guy claiming to be 27.

Everyone was talking about executing a DDOS attack on the channel 4 site. As if they even knew what that entailed. it was pretty funny.

 

[SenseOfTumour]

Pedophiles also buy newspapers, overpriced printer ink, and stamps. Perhaps WHSmith should shut themselves down as they're just encouraging pedophiles.

Especially with their half price candy with any purchase.

Also, Channel 4 show kids' shows in the morning, ideal stuff for a pedophile who owns a TV to attract children into his home, Channel 4 should stop broadcasting to save the poor children from being abused.

Or... they could all fuck off.

Pedophiles exist, they're also in a tiny, tiny minority. Give your kids some basic advice about not going to stranger's homes or cars without telling their parents first, and we can safely go about our day.

Reminds me of when FOX reported the DS as 'a tool for pedophiles', in that it could be used to pass on the name and address and phone number of a child to a pedo. You know, a bit like a pencil.

Come back to me when Habbo Hotel has DLC of naked child avatars and maybe we'll open this case again.

 

[SenseOfTumour]

Just to get this straight, if there were pedos approaching me in WOW, I'd record the chat, take screen grabs, and report them to Blizzard and maybe the police, if I felt I had enough evidence.

I would not take this as 'Blizzard support anal rape of children'.

Call me cynical, but if there's anything TV and the media get excited about more than 'celebrities' it's pedophilia.

When someone pretending to be 12 gets hit on by someone pretending to be 27, has a crime been commited, or are there just a lot of freaks online who get off pretending to be different people?

In the end, we shouldn't be shocked that an online area that attracts children also attracts those who prey on them, however, there's ways to deal with it that doesn't involve just going 'WAH ITS SCARY!', but of course, when's the last time sensible, rational reactions got prime time TV slots.

I am not a pedo apologist, I just think that maybe we should educate kids and parents about online safety, rather than just saying something is an evil den of filth. After all, Habbo closes down, where are the kids going to go that's entirely safe from predators?

 

[Therumancer]

Well, this is the big issue between security and privacy. You have to decide which is a greater evil, the pedos doing this stuff, or the suerveillance and actions needed to stop it.

I've long been a proponent that age limits need to be enforced on MMOs to keep kids out of T and M rated games (including MMOs), and privacy should be expected and enforced. However when dealing with child-specific MMOs there should be no expectation of privacy and the people running it should be constantly on the look out for these kinds of things.

The problem of course being that MMOs exist to make money, children by their very nature don't have a lot of money to sink into MMOs, and as a result something has to be done to market these things to adults. The only other alternative being to say... try and trick kids into "accidently" spending Mommy's credit limit on Smurfberries.

HABBO has been criticized for quite a while for being a pedo-haven, right up there with something called "Furcadia". Even going back as far as the old Habbo Hotel raids, you'll notice that the old "rules" were not only to have the classic guy in a suit with a 'fro but also to logon as a Loli which says a bit (sites like Encyclopedia Dramatica have covered it)... and to be honest it's just gotten worse over the years. I doubt the lack of apparent enforcement or attempts to change things is a coincidence, since it's probably the adults wanting to meet up with kids that are spending most of the money. To be honest after some of the exposes on Second Life, I wouldn't be surprised if we one day found out that Habbo's own GMs login and play/pretend to be sexually active little kids to make money and keep people logging in and spending money. From what I was reading such virtual pedo-prostitution was a big business on Second Life for a while until there was a crackdown.

That said, not selling the cards doesn't seem like it's going to accomplish much. Personally if things have gotten as blatent as described, it might be time for an Interpol sting of sorts, and hopefully the establishment of some precedents as a result.

Some of you might be saying "OMG Theru, your insane" but really, Habbo is old news to me. Indeed the whole "Pool's Closed due to Aids" thing was from the first major Habbo raid.

 

[Oirish_Martin]

Reminds me of when FOX reported the DS as 'a tool for pedophiles', in that it could be used to pass on the name and address and phone number of a child to a pedo. You know, a bit like a pencil.

Man, I love you now, for reminding me of this:

http://penny-arcade.com/2007/02/09/the-most-recent-catastrophe

While driving on the highway, a child molester who is also driving might look into the back seat of your car and see your child using their DS back there. According to this terrifying report, the child molester can then - while driving their car - produce a DS of their own and utilize it to divine your home address. You will recall that he is driving on the highway at speeds approaching sixty miles an hour. One hand is on the wheel and the other is managing the gearbox. Thus, there can be no question.

He is entering these messages into the DS with his erect phallus.

 

[Oirish_Martin]

Also, does anyone remember "toothing"?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toothing

When BlueTooth was released there were people convinced - convinced - that it would result in a deluge of people arranging casual hookups by pinging each other's BlueTooth phones.

 

[Scrustle]

That last quote in the article is pretty funny. What do they think they're trying to say? That the reporters are paedos? Sounds like they would rather use the service unwittingly talking to paedos rather than have them exposed. They're the dumbass.

 

[antipunt]

And nothing of value was lost.

Your avatar is perfect for what you just said.

Glad I wasn't the only one thinking this.

In other news, read a good comment somewhere saying 'pedo-activity' is including normal teenage raging-hormone-time, so yup. Take that for what its worth

 

[teqrevisited]

If people took the time to properly educate their children about the dangers of the internet this wouldn't be so much of a problem. I had no one to teach me how to use the internet safely and I didn't get molested.

Of course these kinds of things will attract paedophiles. Like flies are to shit. You have to expect them and be ready to deal with them, whether it be through advice or active moderation.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Whats the bet that in 10 years time, news outlets will be reporting that pedos are trolling in WoW?

It'd be funny to see them try to pose as pedos in games like CoD, MW and Halo.

 

[Roboto]

Is this pretty exclusively a UK thing? I mean, FOX news has been constantly hammering on how evil and malicious combat games are, but the investors and retailers only put more of it up as a result. One thing on one news channel completely altered an investor's plans? No, I think not, they were going to sell that stock regardless and this was a good public excuse to do it.

 

[weirdee]

That said, not selling the cards doesn't seem like it's going to accomplish much. Personally if things have gotten as blatent as described, it might be time for an Interpol sting of sorts, and hopefully the establishment of some precedents as a result.

No, see, those places stopped selling the cards because they don't want to be associated with that company, not because they're actually directly concerned about the situation.