October 11, 2014

"The Snappening."

"A giant database of intercepted Snapchat photos and videos has been released by hackers who have been collecting the files for years...."
... Snapchat confirmed the images came from third-party sites, while denying that Snapchat's servers were breached by hackers:
We can confirm that Snapchat’s servers were never breached and were not the source of these leaks. Snapchatters were victimized by their use of third-party apps to send and receive Snaps, a practice that we expressly prohibit in our Terms of Use precisely because they compromise our users’ security...
4chan users say the collection of photos has a large amount of child pornography, including many videos sent between teenagers who believed the files would be immediately deleted after viewing. Half of Snapchat's users are teenagers between the ages of 13 and 17.

31 comments:

MayBee said...

Young teens who send other young teens naked pictures of themselves should not be considered to be sending child pornography.

Anonymous said...

They really need to differentiate between evil thirteen-year-old child pornography and hot seventeen-year-old teen pornography.

Ann Althouse said...

"Young teens who send other young teens naked pictures of themselves should not be considered to be sending child pornography."

But someone who systematically harvests thousands of this pictures and dumps them on the internet certainly should!

Ann Althouse said...

"Users of 4chan have downloaded the files and are creating a searchable database that will allow people to search the stolen images by Snapchat username."

Patrick said...

Young teens who send other young teens naked pictures of themselves should not be considered to be sending child pornography."

But someone who systematically harvests thousands of this pictures and dumps them on the internet certainly should!


Agreed, but there have been cases in which prosecutors have charged young girls who have sent such pictures. More reason to not trust prosecutors with much discretion.

Ann Althouse said...

"Agreed, but there have been cases in which prosecutors have charged young girls who have sent such pictures. More reason to not trust prosecutors with much discretion."

Well, what were the specifics in those cases? Wasn't it something like a 17-year-old girl sending porno-type shots to a younger boy, like maybe a 13-year-old, and the parents felt that she was preying on their son?

Ann Althouse said...

Is that different from a 17-year-old boy sending porno-like pictures to a 12-year-old girl?

I'm wondering why you specified a "young girl"?

Is it that you assume she's been lured into sending the picture by a predatory male?

Ann Althouse said...

I agree that the crimes should be defined properly so that they only cover what we genuinely want to see prosecuted.

But there is a huge problem on the horizon here as young people go around photographing everything.

traditionalguy said...

Is Weiner's weiner in there?

campy said...

"I agree that the crimes should be defined properly so that they only cover what we genuinely want to see prosecuted."

IOW, only het male sexuality.

Tari said...

Any parent who lets their teen use Snapchat has taken complete and total leave of their senses. A good amount of the blame for this situation should fall to those parents. Yes, all kids do stupid things, but parents should try a little harder not to be so ignorant. A 5 second Google search would tell parents what this app is most commonly used for. Stopping kids from using apps like this is not that hard.

Mark said...

I feel for the naive kids who used real names.

Bet there's a lot more dicks than expected.

Patrick said...

If I recall it was a15 year old girl sending pictures to an older male, 19 or 20. In PA,I think.

MadisonMan said...

My kids snapchat all the time, but they are now legal age.

Fernandinande said...

Ann Althouse said...
Well, what were the specifics in those cases?


Here are a couple.
++
http://reason.com/blog/2014/04/18/under-new-jersey-law-victim-of-high-scho
WCBS reports that a 16-year-old boy texted eight nude pictures of his 17-year-old ex-girlfriend to new his new, 16-year-old girlfriend, who threatened to post the images on Instagram. When school officials got wind of this nastiness, they contacted police, who arrested the two 16-year-olds for distributing child porngraphy, a crime that carries a penalty of five to 10 years in prison. Since there were eight pictures and each can be counted as a separate offense, it looks like the maximum penalty would be 80 years. If convicted, the two teenagers would have to register as sex offenders, making them subject to reporting requirements, residence restrictions, and a stigma that can ruin careers and relationships.

If that seems like a disproprtionate response, consider this: As WCBS notes, "the 17-year-old girl who was in the photos could also potentially face charges." Assuming she took the photos of herself, making her a perpetrator as well as a victim, she is guilty of producing child pornography, which is punishable by five to 10 years in prison for each of the eight pictures. When she shared those photos with her boyfriend, she committed eight more felonies, each triggering the same five-to-10-year sentence. That's right: In the eyes of the law, the girl who was victimized by the other two students is a worse offender than they are. Naturally, she would also have to register as a sex offender if charged and convicted.
++
http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/07/cops-no-longer-want-photos-of-teens-erec
Readers will recall that prosecutors had obtained a warrant to take the teen to a medical facility, inject him with drugs that would give him an erection, and then photograph his penis. The intrusive demands raised—ahem—eyebrows, and eventually the Manassas City Police backed off.
...
Keep in mind that the crime in question was the mutual and consensual exchange of nude photos between two teenagers. It was perfectly legal for them to have sex, but any such photos constitute child pornography.
++

Anonymous said...

Trying to prohibit teens from using apps like snapchat cannot prevent the problem. I have two young teenage girls. From the time they got phones, we have constantly told them not to take or send a picture that they don't want everyone in school to see, and not to let other people take pictures of them that the don't want everyone in school to see. We explained that once the picture is taken, you cannot control it. I've said the same thing with texts/email.

When snapchat came out, I told them that even though the pictures supposedly are temporary and cannot be saved, that might not be true. I demonstrated that if a picture appears on someone else's phone, even if the recipient can't "save" it, someone with the recipient could use another phone or camera to take a picture of the image on the recipient's phone. (I think this is how the most explicit Antyony Weiner pics got out, but I didn't use that as an example). That got through to them, at least I think and hope so.

If kids don't understand the principle of not sending creating and/or sending this stuff, disallowing use of Snapchat is not going to protect them. There are a number of other ways to distribute this stuff.

MadisonMan said...

My kids have saved many snapchats -- you just do a screengrab. I think all users of snapchat eventually realize this.

Key word being eventually.

I have no idea if they've sent questionable snapchats. Most of them are face shots with them making stupid faces.

YoungHegelian said...

Kidz,

Digital = Forever. Always. No exceptions.

Maybe, just maybe, this "breach" will convince SnapChat's users that they got sold a bill of goods when SnapChat claimed the content "disappears".

It may get immediately deleted from SnapChat's servers (so they claim), but if content appears on a desktop, there's a always a way to capture that content if someone wants to put in the time & energy.

Freeman Hunt said...

"I can't believe you're not going to give your boys smartphones."

Believe it.

damikesc said...

Now, keep in mind, the head of 4chan is a big-time Social Justice Warrior-type who has, literally, no qualms stifling things he doesn't like.

Which means that the moot, the leader of 4chan, actively supports pedophilia.

People have been leaving 4chan over his BS.

cubanbob said...

damikesc said...
Now, keep in mind, the head of 4chan is a big-time Social Justice Warrior-type who has, literally, no qualms stifling things he doesn't like.

Which means that the moot, the leader of 4chan, actively supports pedophilia.

People have been leaving 4chan over his BS.

10/11/14, 2:29 PM"

If the NSA was as good as the are alleged to be then why hasn't the FBI been able to crush 4chan? If we are all going to be spied on then at least lets have some real benefit from the spying in terms of prosecuting real criminals.

MayBee said...

I'm with Tman and MadMan here. It's not the technology, it's the kid.
You've got to try to teach your child to live up to his own standards. There will always be some temptation to do some crazy thing via whatever technology is available. Whether it's polaroid pictures, being alone in a basement, or skinny dipping...kids who want to display their wild side will find a way (and always have).

Tari said...

I don't think y'all are saying anything different than what I said. Obviously it's not just one app that's the problem. Snapchat is only one of a long list of things that aren't allowed in my house. My kids use my Apple ID, and the restrictions are set to disallow changes without my password - so the only apps they get are ones they've asked me for. Only the 14 year old has a smartphone, and he may use it downstairs only - never alone in his room. We have DNS filters, I have his password for every device he uses and I regularly check his browsing history. All of that is called "parenting".

We also talk to him (and as appropriate, his younger brother) about what you don't say and do online. Just like we talk to him about how to behave in person. Repeatedly. Every day. Again: parenting. I've already seen too many "good" boys with phones full of porn, doing and saying God-knows-what online, and their parents have no idea whatsoever. That will not be my kid. He's going to make mistakes, but that doesn't give me license to throw up my hands in defeat and stop being his mother.

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

1. Is there a problem here? If so, what exactly is the problem?

2. If there is a problem, is it proper that Government do something about it? If so, what level of Government?

How much of your Power and Liberty will you cede to Government in the hope that Government action will protect people from their own foolishness or idiocy.

And what business is it of yours anyhow to constrain others from foolish acts which do you no personal harm? Leave them alone. Grant them the Liberty to make mistakes, without which there can be no comprehension of the real world.

tim in vermont said...

My daughters use snapchat all the time, especially to keep in touch with each other.

There is no way to keep up with these things so you have to raise them right in other ways. Mostly to respect themselves. I hadn't even heard of snapchat until they had been using it for a long time.

tim in vermont said...

Don't bring "skinny dipping" into this! I would never want to deprive my children of the memories of youth I enjoy. I am more of a "respect yourself, yes, but gather ye rosebuds while ye may" kind of parent.

But when we used to skinny dip at the creek, or at the reservoir in college, there were no cameras.

There was the time my friend claimed he saw a creepy old man watching us and whacking off, but hey, that is way different then getting naked pictures of us out their world-wide for life when googled.

tim in vermont said...

So Tari, your kid's phone doesn't have a browser?

Freeman Hunt said...

What is the point of giving a kid a smartphone? You can make calls and send texts from a dumbphone. Pronouncing a twelve year old "mature" and giving him a handheld Internet browsing device strikes me as comically doltish. Twelve year olds are not mature. Full stop.

There's also the enormous timesink factor. Every minute spent futzing around on an immersive bit of handheld electronics is a minute not spent doing something interesting, and all of those minutes add up fast.

Additionally, it's important to remember that you have no control over what other people choose to send to your child's device. You will already have enough trouble with what people will email.

Let the frontal lobes connect a bit more. And it might be worth mentioning that the number of young people addicted to pornography accessed via their smartphones is legion.

Again: parenting. I've already seen too many "good" boys with phones full of porn, doing and saying God-knows-what online, and their parents have no idea whatsoever.

This times one hundred.

I remember a boy in high school who was extremely popular with girls' mothers. They adored him. He would ask about them and make a point of feigning interest in them. He was probably the most crass, predatory boy in school.

Tari said...

Tim, he's on our wireless network when he's in the house, and his school network when he's there. Both have filters on them, so the chances of him coming across something untoward are fairly low. I also enabled whatever Safari has in the way of "safe search" on his phone, and locked the restrictions with my passcode.

And we talk to him about why all of this matters. As you said, you have to raise them right to begin with.

Freeman Hunt said...

But when we used to skinny dip at the creek, or at the reservoir in college, there were no cameras.

Exactly. The sins of one's youth used to be the sins of one's youth, existing only in memory. Now they are preserved in high definition for perpetuity. It's a different world.

Anonymous said...

A teen relative tried to get me on snapchat a year or so ago and I remember thinking "Why would I want to get on that? I'm not going to be sending naked pix to my little school friends."

Heh. It doesn't even matter if you are the tech literate rep of your gen if you have no one your age to talk to on the platform.