Cyber Safety
LIKEE: What parents need to know about this risky TikTok wannabe
With 500 million downloads on the Google Playstore, video creation app Likee is giving TikTok a run for its money. So why are experts calling it “a paedophile’s paradise”? Here’s what you need to know.
What is Likee?
Likee’s developers describe the app as a “global short video creation platform, with cutting-edge special effects, video shooting and editing tools.”
Initially released in July 2017 as LIKE video, the recently rebranded Singapore-based app is challenging TikTok for dominance in the fast-growing video space.
Likee offers an array of attractions for young users: filters, stickers and cutting edge special effects. It also allows kids to livestream to their fanbase.
Like TikTok, Likee users can share and comment on each others’ content, and message privately. They also get access to a free music library, or upload their own music.
Special themed events allow kids to earn real-world cash by racking up likes. They can also spend real money in the app.
Likee is free, and has a 17+ age restriction.
So what’s not to Likee?
Tons.
'I just spent the last five hours at the police station after discovering that my minor child had been harassed by some freak pervert and manipulated in to taking nude photos of herself and sending them to him. She's 10.”
For starters, Likee automatically displays the user’s location with every post. What’s more
- Accounts can’t be made private
- Users can filter a search by gender
- There is no age verification process
- Mature and risky content abounds
- In-app parental controls are ineffectual
It’s not just the swearing, suggestive clothes and dances and references to substance abuse that should concern parents. It’s the commenting and private messaging, allowing predators and paedophiles - often adults posing as children - to target kids with salacious comments and vile “challenges.”
“This is a paedophile’s paradise,” says Family Zone cyber expert and prominent child psychologist Michael Carr-Greg.
“Predators are not stupid, they know exactly where the kids are and how to find them.”
App reviews by parents spell out the dangers in horrifying detail.
'I just spent the last five hours at the police station after discovering that my minor child had been harassed by some freak pervert and manipulated in to taking nude photos of herself and sending them to him. She's 10.”
'Your kids WILL be preyed upon. There are grown men pretending to be children. A man sent a photo of his penis to my ten-year-old.”
Reference: https://www.familyzone.com/anz/families/blog/likee-what-parents-need-to-know