Kids as young as EIGHT are being groomed on TikTok app

Kids as young as eight are being targeted by predators and bombarded with sexually explicit messages on new social media app, TikTok.

TikTok, which lets users create and share short videos with music and camera effects, has been labelled a ‘magnet for paedophiles’ by concerned parents.

Once logged in with an account, users are able to post videos of themselves which are then broadcast to other people, any of whom can then message the person directly.

Horrified parents have revealed how their children had been subjected to unwanted aggressive direct messages from older men.

Chris Moralee, 38, from Bradford, said he was disgusted by what he found on the app on his ten-year-old son Denver’s phone.

He said: “His phone kept flashing up like someone had messaged. I kept seeing this same man’s name coming up.

“The messages he received said ‘hello are you there?’, ‘stop f***ing ignoring me’ then he said ‘I will find you’, ‘where are you?’ He was sending these messages to a ten-year-old. Denver was terrified.

“The person had a picture. I didn’t report it to police because I deleted the app, I wish I had told the police but I was keen to just get rid of it.

“I went on to my son’s phone to look at what had been sent and I looked at the content.

“He’s only ten…there must be a way for them to get parents’ permission to get on it. But there’s no way of them verifying their age.”

Charities have also warned about the dangers of the app.

Barnardo’s issued a warning saying kids had been encouraged to engage in sexual activity online by predators in the comments section of the app.

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Written by

George Day

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