A phone app has been the gateway for pedophiles to access children – with deadly results.
It’s called “kik.”
What parents need to know is that kik does not offer any parental controls and there is no way of authenticating users.
“Kik allows you to establish an account using a user name – you do not have to use your actual cell phone number, and users on kik are unable to identify who they are actually talking to.” – Sgt. Jeff Kertson, Fresno County Sheriff’s Office.
13 year old Nicole Lovell (seen pictured above) went missing on January 27th in Blacksburg, Virginia, her body was found three days later -in just one incident that is the latest crime to highlight the dangers of abuse through the app and social media.
David Eisenauser, 18, has been charged with killing her and Natalie Keepers, 19 (above left), has been accused of disposing of the 13 year old’s body.
A neighbor of Nicole’s family said that on the day she vanished the 13-year-old had shown her daughters a photograph on Kik of ‘David’, along with a thread of texts they had shared using the Kik Messenger app on her phone.
Sergeant Jeff Kertson from the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office says this type of exchange on kik and other apps is happening here in the Central Valley.
Sgt. Kertson works on a task force to fight these type of crimes, saying “We’ve had multiple cases here in our own local jurisdiction in which we’ve had adult predators who prey upon children using the kik app.”
Sgt. Kertson says they have had several cases of “sex-tortion” as older predators blackmail young victims.
“Generally it’s an older adult male – preys upon a young male or female, sometimes as young as 10-12 years old, and they demand sexual acts in return with threats being made that if they do not produce these acts that they will publish and embarrass the user over the social media.”
Parents can fight back by installing any number of mobile watchdog apps for their child’s phone that allow they to monitor and /or control the content of information on the electronics.
Sergeant Jeff Kertson says whether it’s a phone or computer the child is using – the best involvement is parental involvement.
“Know what your kids are doing on their phones.”
