A Pop-Up Chat: How My Second Grader Fell Victim to an Online Predator

(upbeat music) You're busy, but you want the best for your kids. We're here to help. This is Hope and Well, a parenting podcast from Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. (upbeat music) Technology can be a wonderful thing, but sometimes the benefits come at a cost. Social media online gaming apps, chat rooms, you name it, the internet can expose children to some scary stuff, including bullying, inappropriate content, identity theft, and online predators. And new technology just keeps coming. Hi, I'm Lynn Smith, and welcome to Hope and Well, a parenting podcast from Children's Healthcare of Atlanta where we share real stories, from real families, and clinical insight from pediatric specialists, many of whom are parents just like you. On today's episode, we're gonna be speaking with Rachel, whose daughter Ava was the victim of online sexual exploitation, and program manager of the Stephanie V. Blank Center for Safe and Healthy Children at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. Angie Boy, Rachel and Angie are here to help you navigate internet safety for kids of all ages. (upbeat music) Rachel, thank you so much for joining us. I want to get to know your family first before we get what happened to Ava. Tell me a little bit about your girls. So Ava is nine. She loves gymnastics. She loves the swimming pool. She loves arts and crafts. She's my lovely devi of the two, definitely. But I guess that goes hand in hand with being the baby. So then there's Brianna, she's 13. You know, she was the one who made me a mama. So there's a special bond there. Brianna, she loves sports. She's showing me so many new things every day on the computer, which is so funny because I remember getting frustrated with my own parents, trying to use the computer. And now our kids are teaching us all about technology. That can be a good thing and a scary thing. So tell me a little bit about what kind of technology were they using at the time when the incident happened? Tell me what they were doing. So Brianna had a laptop. It was something we got for school. It was like you're in middle school now. You have your own laptop. Yay. But there were rules, restrictions on that. And Ava, she had originally, maybe I would say a year prior, she had one of those kitty iPads. And you know, it had the bright pink sparkles. It had a really cool case that could prop it up and something happened to it. I don't even remember what. And the screen didn't work anymore. So I had received an iPad from Mother's Day the year before. So I had it for not very long. And I let Ava use it. She wanted to play with her sister. She wanted to get on. They play a game called Roblox. So tell me about some of the security precautions that you took. She had her iPad that she got from you. And you had parental controls on it, right? I did. So at the time, I was an Apple girl. I had my iPad. My husband had a desktop, an Apple desktop. I had my iPhone. And so everything was Apple. So I knew how to use the parental controls on there already. Most parents do. Just from your kid wanting to play with your phone while you're at dinner, the doctor's office. So you learn slowly. But I had the touch with your fingerprint where I had to, if anything was going to be downloaded, my Apple pay, I had restrictions on it, where not only with the content, but with the time the time spent on it, it would send me notifications to my phone. I had to approve. And sometimes Ava had to come to me, and I had to put my thumbprint on it. So I felt pretty good about it. Were there any apps you were using or anything that allowed you to know exactly what they were looking at? Yes, I was able to see which apps they spent their time on and how long, an hour here, an hour here. So I thought I was doing what I needed to do to make sure that I was protecting them. Unfortunately, everything with parenting, there's always something that slides through. Exactly. And for this, tell me exactly what happened to Ava in this particular game. We're hanging out at home, and my 13-year-old came up to me and said, "Mommy, Ava's talking to people." And I said, "What?" She said, "You know, we're not supposed to be talking to people online and chatting. That's what we call it. We're not supposed to be chatting, Mommy, and Ava's chatting." And she was afraid to tell me my 13-year-old. And so your older came to you and said, "She's chatting online, and what did you do?" So I immediately went straight to Ava. I said, "Have you been chatting?" And she said, "Yes." I started going through the iPad. And at first I just saw, you know, "Hey, hi." So I had a face, stuff that didn't make sense. But then I noticed that there were people in there that were seem creepy to me. And I found more than one person that was acting like they were in a relationship with Ava. They were, "Where have you been all day?" And Ava was like, "Fine." And you know, she didn't even answer the question, right? Yeah. 'Cause she's little, she's no idea. They were asking her to send pictures of herself. She was begging them, "Please, please, please." I'm sorry, I was at my softball game. Then they said, "Do you want to see me?" And they just sent her pictures of themselves. When you're going through these messages, what's going through your mind as a mother, that there are grown adults that are communicating with your eight-year-old and sending pictures that are sexual in nature? Obviously, like, that they were adults. But I remember being physically, feeling ill. Tears were just running down my face as I was scrolling. Angry, really angry. I didn't even know what to say to her. Felt so weird. I can only imagine. And this is an online video game where there's a chat feature. Right. Roblox is the original game she was playing, but that game had a pop-up. Roblox pretty much when you look at it, it's a great game. But what she did is in that game itself, there was a pop-up. She clicked on it, so it's like an application where all the games you love to play can be in one place. And there's a chat. I just got chills saying that because to me, that sounds like a pedophile playground. You know, all the games in one place and a place that she can fall into that chat box, which she did. So what did you do when you found these messages? What happened next? I told my husband. He called the police because we wanted those people. They asked her for pictures. And she sent them a picture of her legs, too. Ava did, or a face picture, which she looked like a child. She's a baby. She was wearing Hello Kitty pajamas in one. I was like, wow. So you called the police and what conversation did you have with Ava? First I had to calm down. And then when we talked, I told her that what happened to her wasn't OK. That it was wrong. And that if she wanted to talk about it, that I was here. She said she didn't want to talk about it. And I told her that I understand. She didn't want to talk about it right now. But never talking about it, it's not an option. And that that's what mommy said for her, you know? And I just assured her that I loved her. And that I wanted her to know that I was sorry. What would you say is the warning to parents out there that have the parental controls in place that feel like they're doing all the right things? Scammers and these kinds of people, they're always finding something new. And it's not the same as when we were kids. It's not the look out for the slow, creepy cars. And don't get into any stranger's car. Don't wear your name on your shirt. That was a thing. Think bigger. Not only should you give your kids protection, but give them that knowledge, give them information. You know, stop signs. Hey, when this happens, that's a big stop sign. We talk about that. My kids are nice. What's a stop sign? She'll tell me. And you know, Ava has one game now where she can chat with one friend. It's her sister. And she's happy. She loves it and gave her that privilege. And sadly, she had to learn just how dangerous this can be. And you called the police. What happened after you called the police? What did you do? We were called by the detective and he asked us to come be evaluated at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. So you went to Children's Healthcare of Atlanta and tell me about that. My mother and I took Ava to Children's and we met with their amazing team there. I honestly did not know what to expect. I was scared. It didn't seem like it was my life. (laughs) I know that sounds so cliche to say, but it really didn't. And then what did the treatment look like? They interviewed my mother and I. They interviewed Ava. Well, Ava was playing the whole time with one of their therapists and I met with a police officer. We talked about, apparently there were pedophiles. They were already watching. They already kind of knew about this going on so it was kind of an ongoing case. And did you feel at the end of it that you got the answers that you needed on how to help her through this? They definitely helped give me a lot of information. They were so awesome. It was a great experience. They gave me some resources for counseling. They offered to do counseling for Ava. I just felt really good. When I left there, I was like, I felt so glad I went. I was like, oh, thank God. But I didn't want to go. You know, I didn't want to face what happened. Not to truly what it was, right? But Ava was better. And she's now getting the help that she needs. That's the most important thing. And Rachel, she is. And she's thriving. Thank you for being with us and sharing that story so that other parents can know some of the dangers that are out there. Of course, thank you so much for having me. (upbeat music) Angie, thanks so much for being here. This is really scary for parents. They don't know how to navigate it. So I love that you have a center. The Stephanie V. Blank Center for Safe and Healthy Children. Can you tell me a little bit about how you protect our kids? Sure. We are a medical model child advocacy center with childrens. And we see patients who have been victims of obesity neglect, but then my side of the house handles prevention and training. So we do a wide variety of training in the community. Parents, educators, students, pretty much anybody that reaches out to request a training. And we provide training on a lot of different topics. One of our most popular right now is online safety. So we talk to parents about what's out there, what their kids are using, how they can protect themselves, how they can protect their kids. And then we also have programs for kids where we talk about a lot of different things depending on the ages of the kids from digital citizenship to true online safety and how to navigate using apps and websites and all kinds of things that kids are exposed to online. And I'm so glad Angie that you're here to talk about specifically what's out there. And that's what the Stephanie Blank Center does. What's out there when it comes to dangers on the internet? What are some of the things that you've seen in your scope of work? There are a lot of different areas where kids are accessing content online. So there are some dangers that are related to explicit content that parents may just not want their children to see, whether it's pornographic images, graphic content, violence, things like that. But then there are also predators. And that's where our biggest concern is. And that's where we tend to see victimization. Kids share information, sometimes very innocently, thinking they're talking to a peer. When really they're talking to an adult who is disguising how old they are and breaking down the walls that kids will put up their sort of protective walls. And getting those little bits of information and then they put all of that together and will approach a child. Maybe they'll ask for a photo or they'll ask to meet. And kids don't always realize that people they're talking to online are strangers. We see kids all the time, like, oh no, I know them. I've been talking to them online for six months. But you've never met them. You've never seen them in real life. That's still a stranger. And so that's one of the big things we talked to parents about, particularly with younger kids, is if you haven't met them in real life, not just seen them on a video call or a video chat, but met them in real life, they're a stranger and need to be treated that way. And really building up their digital security in that sense, recognizing that people aren't who they say they are online. And this is exactly what happened to Rachel's daughter, Ava. She was playing this video game that I know. A ton of my friends let their kids play. Then there was a pop-up that put her into a chat. And she fell down that rabbit hole of interacting with a stranger who was asking for these photos. It's disgusting when you think about it. And beyond just having a conversation with your kids on how to avoid that conversation, how do you protect them from even getting there in the first place? Well, the biggest way to protect is that you're constantly supervising their experiences online. We like to say that the internet is this vast, unsupervised activity. You would never let your child go to an after-school program that wasn't supervised. But any time you give them access to the internet and you're not supervising, then they've got unsupervised time. And so no phones, tablets, computers, and the bedroom. Any internet activity is done in common areas. You're listening in to what they're doing. If they're watching a movie or you think they're watching a movie and they start having a conversation, ask who they're talking to. Why are they having a conversation in the middle of watching Netflix? And so are they really watching what you think they're watching? Go in and check. What movie are you watching? You told me you were on Netflix. Why do I see you on YouTube? And be willing to be annoying about it. I drive my daughter crazy all the time. Just sort of spot checking. What are you watching? What are you encountering online? And thankfully, she hasn't yet really delved beyond toy videos on YouTube. But it's a concern. And so you want to make sure that you know where your kids are going online, just like you know where they're going in real life. You know who they're encountering. And what apps and other websites they might be using. We see a lot of parents who-- their kids are on social media, but the parents aren't. That's dangerous, because you don't know what's out there. You don't know what your kids are encountering and how you can best protect if you're not aware of what's going on in the social media world. And I know people are out there listening right now saying I don't have time to monitor this. That's why I'm putting them on the iPad. I've got to work. I've got to get stuff done. And this is going to keep them busy so I can get this accomplished. So what do you say to those parents? Are there apps that we can put in place that will block any of this from happening? First thing we would always recommend is go into the settings for the phone or tablet you have, whether it's an Apple device or an Android. And make sure you've got the tightest restrictions. So make sure that you've got the highest level of security on your devices. Then look for a third-party system that works best for your family, something like NetNanny, Bark, WebWatcher, things like that that you can put on your device. It uses pieces of software that you can use that will help track where your child is going. The concern, though, is a lot of times these notify you after the fact. So it's not always as simple as, you know, you've got this and now you're good. You still have to have that oversight and have those conversations about where you're going, what you're doing. And with younger kids, it's a little easier because you can put on guided access on a tablet and they can't leave the app you put them on. So with younger kids, it's easier. As they get older and get a little more tech savvy, that's when it really becomes important that you have conversations about safe use. You have conversations about what the consequences are if you find that they're going places they're not supposed to go and that you are constantly checking in with them. Not necessarily sitting right over their shoulder, but you're having conversations about what they're doing and how they're interacting with other people, even online. It's not too much that they're doing anything wrong and looking at inappropriate content, but are they being a good digital citizen, you know, or maybe they're a victim of cyberbullying or maybe unfortunately they're perpetrating cyberbullying. Those are the kinds of things you're looking for too. It's not necessarily just the online predator. There's such a wide range of issues that parents have to think about. These are conversations that are hard to have. Do you have any advice on how to best approach it? Start simple. Ask about, you know, hey, I heard about this crazy new trend on TikTok or I saw a news article about this. Have you heard about this and see what your child says? You know, these are for older kids, obviously, that are interacting on social media. Start that way. You know, and say, hey, have you heard about this? This seems kind of crazy. Is this something happening or is this, you know, the news media blowing it out of proportion or whatever that you kind of are easing into the conversation? But with younger kids, you ask them, what are you learning in school about technology? You know, can you show me what you've learned? Can you show me the sites that you're going to at school and start having conversations about, okay, these are great sites. What other sites do you know about and see what they tell you? And then say, how do you know what to do or what would you do if you saw something that you didn't like online? Could be something scary. It could be, you know, that they accidentally see something inappropriate. What would you do? And sort of have the conversations that way, Tori, you're not being accusatory. You're not making them think the internet is bad, but you want to make sure they know they can come to you if something goes wrong. Right, it's a balance of you don't want to scare them too much and then you don't want them to just feel so free that they could go into some dangerous situations. If they do, and there's some personality changes, what should we be looking for that might set off that alarm bell? Okay, they might have been put in a situation where they've been victimized online. If they seem secretive, you know, they're trying to hide what they're doing, if you go to do a random check and all of a sudden the history has been cleared, what are they hiding? Why do they want to clear the history? Are they, you know, getting text messages or messages from numbers that you don't recognize? Numbers that may not be saved as a contact in their phone. So it may be, you know, a name you don't recognize, but it's because this is a new friend or it's a new study partner. But if it's just a random phone number, that's concerning. So how did this person get your contact information? How are they contacting you on Discord or on WhatsApp? How are you getting these contacts made? So, you know, multiple numbers you don't recognize, secretive behavior, they may start withdrawing, acting more fearful. Maybe they are not wanting to go online anymore. When, you know, they really liked playing a particular gate through a gaming system and now they don't want to do that anymore. Any of the behaviors that just seem a little off, we don't always want to chalk it up to, oh, they're a teenager, it's just moody, you know, it's the way they are. Maybe, but maybe not. Maybe there's something they're concerned about. And it may be particularly with younger kids, maybe they did an internet search, just typical childhood exploration, and they typed in, you know, breasts into a Google search engine, and ended up seeing something they weren't prepared to see, and now they're afraid, you know. And one of the things we encourage is that parents, when their kids are online, is that they've got some sort of contract or agreement with their kids, particularly older kids, that sort of outlines, this is how we're using devices, this is how we're using the internet in our household. You know, these are the rules about where they get charged, who handles, you know, the bills, all that kind of thing. What sites are appropriate, what sites aren't. But then you also talk about what happens if inappropriate content is viewed. And, you know, you can tell me, I'm not going to get mad. There might be consequences, but I want you to feel like you can come tell me. So they know that it's okay, even if they've messed up, and they've done something they really shouldn't have done, you'd rather know and be able to address it, than to have them fearful and not reaching out for help. What age should we be having these conversations? A lot of four, five, and six year olds have those iPads, even with safety devices. I mean, Ava was eight, so when do we have this conversation? - When they start using a device. And sometimes it's as simple as, "Hey, here's the iPad, we're going to watch, you know, Bluey or whatever together." And then the iPad's going to go away, because we only use it for an hour a day. That's a simple contract with a three year old. You know, then as they move into school, they're more accustomed to rules and codes of conduct, and things like that, because they have them in their classrooms. So you can have that conversation as they move into elementary school about, you know, I'm trusting you with this device, whether it's a tablet, a phone, but here are our code of conduct when using it. And then you just continue to advance it as they mature. So we don't like to put an age on anything, just because so much is dependent on the maturity level of the child, but you really want to revisit these conversations pretty regularly. Reexamine, if you have a written contract that everybody has signed, you revisit it at least every six months, because their maturity level is changing. Technology's changing. You know, maybe there's a new app that you're like, nope, we're not going to use that app in our family. I don't know the app well enough, it's not safe. So we're just not going to use it. The contract needs to be updated. And also be mindful of the friends that they're watching their iPads. By son, as six and a half, and he doesn't have a device himself, but his friends who are older has one. And so when he tells me he's seen a TikTok, and I think to myself, you've never seen TikTok, well, I have with this friend. And it sets off that alarm button saying, it's not just what's happening inside your own home. So it's a reminder to parents, really whatever age they're exposed, wherever they're exposed. Angie, can you give me a couple of examples? What's a typical month like of what kind of different interactions children are having online that scare you? We see several different examples of things that come across just within the last month or so, a sexual assault of an older teenager who met the perpetrator online. So we see examples of that come through the emergency department and then come through our clinic. We'll see examples of kids who have shared photos online, or via text message, inappropriate photos that have gone back and forth. And those photos end up being shared. And the child is then a victim of exploitation, much like what was talked about earlier. We see all kinds of things come through our clinic on a regular basis. It's pretty frightening to even imagine that that's the potential and the important information you point out these photo sharing. It's something called metadata. Can you explain that to me? That is the information on your photo. So any photo that you take has metadata on it that gives the location of the photo. We'll tell the date and time, that kind of thing. Turning off location settings on your phone is the biggest way to protect against that being able to be used, because perpetrators can use a piece of software that costs about $100. And they can capture the metadata off of photos. That you're posting on social media? Yeah, you can go in. And any time you see a photo on social media that says, taken at such and such place, marry out of Georgia, you can go grab the metadata off that photo. And you can find it with this simple piece of software to within about 10 yards of the location of that photo. So turning off location settings is big. That helps protect. You can turn location settings on for things like maps and that kind of thing when you're using it. Or your weather apps or things of that nature. So you get those emergency alerts. But you're not broadcasting your location. The other thing you can do is take screenshots of your photos and post the screenshot. That does not have the metadata attached to it. So there are a variety of different ways you can protect for photos. But turning off location settings is one of the biggest that you can protect a little more strongly. Angie, thank you. Wow, I did not realize that. That's pretty scary. What about when it comes to some older teens? High schoolers and their hashtagging certain things. Are they talking about certain sports teams? Yeah, with high schoolers, because they're more likely to be using social media. So they're more likely to be on Instagram and TikTok and maybe Facebook, but probably not. You really have to be careful when you're using hashtags to avoid accidentally identifying yourself. We've seen some kids who know all about not sharing their age online, not sharing their school and things like that. But then you go look at the hashtags and their profile. And it's #ClassOf2023 #MHSGirlSucker #JuniorYear. Well, they've just told everybody. And perpetrators can use that. And they can find, oh, this MHS-- I can find that school. I can find that soccer schedule. And they can show up at the soccer field. So being careful about what hashtags you use, and are they identifiable? And just being careful with what you put out there in terms of hashtags. So just being aware of where teenagers are going with their app use, how are they using them? Are the location settings turned off? How are they interacting with people? And again, with things like Instagram, their mental health concerns around comparison. So making sure that they're in a good mental health head space, not just their physical online safety, but also their mental health and wellbeing, depending on what they're doing online. Can we talk for a minute about these YouTube toy games that you talk about? These are people doing random things. I've seen many of them. They weird me out a little bit, but kids are obsessed with them. Are these videos of just average people unboxing games and playing and having all of these challenges? Is this appropriate for kids? And is there a way that we can block them? Most of them are fairly harmless. They are ridiculously annoying as a parent who has a child who loves them. So if you can avoid your child seeing them, that would be the best way. Short of banning them from going on YouTube, there's no real way to avoid them. What we talk about in my household, because the issue becomes clicking on other videos that are recommended. And then looking into the comments and making comments or looking and seeing what's there, because that's usually where predators are hanging out. They're in the comments where they'll go into a connected video. So what I've talked about with my daughter is the comments section is off limits. And you cannot click on an associated video unless it is the same thing. That's one way to address it if they've already seen these videos and know they're out there. The other thing you can do, you can change the URL in a video to where when you play that video, it will not bring up associated videos. Teachers use it a lot in classrooms when they want to show a video on the Bill of Rights, but they don't want this whole host of other videos popping up. They'll tweak the URL. And then only the video they're wanting their students to watch comes up. - That's such a good advice. I can imagine you talk a lot about your daughter here. You have to deal with this yourself. You've seen the worst of the worst, and yet you still have to be the parent just like us. How does it influence you? - I'm much more particular about where she goes and what she sees online, what videos she's allowed to watch. Her limits are much more stringent than a lot of her friends. And I'm already getting the, well, so and so can do it. So we'll be hearing that a lot as she gets older, but she knows what I do. I'm honest about what I do for a living, and so she knows, not obviously, the horrible details of what we do, but she knows that there's bad out there, and my job is to protect her from that. And so it also helps that we have these conversations so she knows, and she's been really good about asking, and if she has something she wants to watch, but it's above TVG, she comes to ask, and I'll look at it and decide. And I oftentimes are saying yes more than I'm saying no, but if I say no, I tell her why. And explain why I'm saying no. And so far it has worked. Now she's only nine. So I think if she gets older, that'll get more difficult. But I think because I've laid those expectations out, and she understands where I'm coming from, it makes it a little bit easier to tolerate. It also helps, she doesn't have a phone, and won't have one of her own until at least middle school. So I can control in a lot of respects that way, because anything that gets downloaded to the family iPad, I have to approve the same thing with my phone. I have to approve what's going on it, so I know what she's accessing. - That's so great. I'm hearing so many actionable items that parents can do today, having a contract with your kids to set limits, having important conversations about what to look for, monitoring and supervising their activities, 'cause you wouldn't just let them go out and stay in the neighborhood unsupervised. And finally I would imagine it's a lot of modeling that we do as parents. If we're posting all of these pictures that are not being a good digital citizen ourselves on social media, that's not gonna look good to our children, and also could be putting them in danger as well. Could you talk to me about that? - Sure, when you post your back to school pictures, or your family pictures, you wanna make sure that they don't have identifying information. It's okay to say they're going to fourth grade, or it's the first day of fourth grade, but you don't wanna list the school they're in, the teacher, their favorite color, what they wanna be when they grow up, those are dangerous. If you wanna take those pictures for posterity, and you wanna post them on Facebook because everybody else says, blur out some of those details. Blur out the name of the school, blur out their teacher's name. Some of those details that a predator can use to approach your child. When you're posting and you're putting hashtags on posts, be careful that your hashtag doesn't accidentally identify something about your child that you weren't thinking about. But then also think about what you're posting online about your kids in general, when it comes to you digital citizenship, making sure that what you're posting is uplifting about your child, that you're posting positives, not the melting down at target. That's embarrassing to you a child. We wouldn't want somebody to post a meltdown we had on the internet. So why do we do that to kids? And so thinking about all of the ways we post things online, and making sure that we're modeling good digital citizenship, that we don't get involved in arguments online. And we're careful about what we post about our kids. - Maybe if we all follow your advice, the internet would be much safer a place that I wish that was the case. I hope that this information just transforms parents in the way that I know myself it has. There are gonna be big changes that I make. So Angie, thank you so much for being with us. - Sure, glad to be here. - I wanna thank Rachel and Angie for coming on the show today and sharing their first-hand experiences and offering insight into the best ways to keep your family safe online. For more about this episode and our podcast content, visit chowah.org/podcasts. That's ch-o-a.org/podcasts. - I'm Lynn Smith and this has been Hope and Will, a parenting podcast from Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. - This podcast is for general informational and educational purposes only. It is not to be considered medical advice for any particular patient. Clinicians must rely on their own informed clinical judgments when making recommendations for their patients. Patients in need of medical or behavioral advice should consult their family healthcare providers. (upbeat music)