Snapchat Shows New Warning To Protect Teenagers From Sextortion

Snapchat improves alert features for teenage accounts (photo: dock. Snap)

JAKARTA Snapchat, a platform developed by Snap, created a new protection feature for teenage accounts. This feature began rolling out on Tuesday, June 25 to address the trend of sextortion scams. Derived from the combined word sex and extortion, this term refers to an act of persuading one to transmit intimate or personal content. After that, victims will be forced to pay or engage in sexual intercourse. Actions like this often occur on social media, including on Snapchat. Therefore, Snap launched a new tool that can provide alerts inside the chat room. A teenage account will be notified if the sender of the detected messages is dangerous. "Remaja will now see a warning message if they receive a chat from someone who has been blocked or reported by others, or originated from an area where the network of teenagers is usually not located," Snap said. This warning will be seen at the bottom of the chat room. Snapchat will include a message that reads, "(username) has been reported by Snapchatters others. Are you sure you want to start a conversation?"

Under the warning, users will see two options offered. They can help block and report the account by clicking Report or Block. If users still want to start a chat, they can click OK. By increasing sextortion alerts, Snap wants to help users who are often the target of the scam method. Snap wants to fight online sex extortion and get rid of criminals as quickly as possible from its platform. "This update continues our efforts to address the growing trend of advanced sextortion scams, committed by financially motivated criminals, usually located outside the United States," Snap explained.