Study Highlights Child Safety Concerns on Twitch: A “Predator’s Paradise” for Teen Users

A recent scientific study has shed light on the potential risks associated with the live streaming platform “Twitch,” which is owned by the American tech giant Amazon. The study suggests that the platform poses a concern for children by allowing them to “interact with adult strangers and fundraising platforms without the oversight of their parents.”

Researchers who presented their findings at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics discovered that “a significant number of teenage users on the Twitch platform are willing to share their personal information, often without being fully aware of who might have access to this data.”

This study, which focused on the activities of 100 teenage users who broadcast their content on Twitch, indicated that this feature is particularly popular among avid gamers.

The research team, who has aptly labeled Twitch as the “Predator’s Paradise,” found that among the 100 users who engage in live streaming and have amassed 1.7 million followers, 47% of the time they disclose their real names, and 50% of the time, they reveal their physical locations. Furthermore, the platform allows around 37% of broadcasters to receive monetary donations from viewers.

The researchers also observed that discussions during live streams included personal details about 11% of the time, particularly among broadcasters seeking to engage with their viewers and discuss specific locations they frequent. The researchers noted that it takes as little as 12 seconds to identify child followers in different gaming categories.

The research team, led by Dr. Ruth Milani, emphasized the need for parents to “actively monitor all their children’s interactions on this platform to ensure their safety.”

On the other hand, Fiona Duborsa, a visiting researcher at the Cohen Children’s Medical Center, expressed skepticism about the legitimacy of the template that allows children to receive donations on the platform. Twitch boasts around 35 million daily users and 7 million monthly live streamers.

She remarked, “The notion that anyone can make monetary donations to a live streamer, regardless of their age, raises significant manipulation concerns,” highlighting the potential for this method to be exploited for fundraising purposes.

It’s important to mention that Twitch has taken steps to address these concerns by providing tools that enable parents to modify privacy settings for user accounts. Additionally, automated features have been implemented to identify and mitigate harmful behaviors that may pose risks to children on the platform.

In the past year, Twitch initiated a campaign aimed at deactivating accounts of users under the age of 13, following a report by Bloomberg News Agency that highlighted the potential exposure of more than 270,000 underage users to harassment attempts by adult users.

Study Highlights Child Safety Concerns on Twitch: A “Predator’s Paradise” for Teen Users

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