The São Paulo Public Ministry has been working since last month on a task force to identify at least 50 children and adolescents victims of abuse on the Discord platform.
In recent weeks, five people have been arrested for inciting mutilations, carrying out virtual rapes and making a series of threats using the social network.
The MP asks that complaints about crimes in the application be sent to the email [email protected]. In response, Discord updated its security policies and launched on Tuesday (11) a service to support parents in observing what teens and children are doing on the social network.
Without knowing the content of the conversations, those responsible will be able to know which communities the children are using, users with whom they have made calls and people added.
Lesser known than the already traditional Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and WhatsApp, Discord emerged as a video game discussion forum in 2015, but, in Brazil, it became famous for the explosion of crimes committed on the platform.
The MP created a Task Force with seven prosecutors and based on the report of a witness who handed investigators a large set of videos and audios on various Discord channels.
In the media, young girls are threatened, incited to mutilate themselves, suffer virtual rape and torture in an environment steeped in racism, misogyny and apology for Nazism, according to investigation documents obtained by the CNN .
In addition to identifying victims, the MP investigates the use of the platform as a database for pedophile materials.
There is also an inquiry to investigate and determine the civil liability of Discord itself: for the investigators, there is a lack of security on the platform, which leads to the occurrence of various crimes, and the mechanisms that the platform has for filtering content for children and adolescents and of moderating criminal content are still unclear.
“The ones practiced against female children and adolescents stand out, in which the offended, seduced or in some way misled, give images and videos of themselves with pornographic or nudity content and, later, are embarrassed by the agents, upon threat of exposure of such images and videos, to comply with their orders, which include, in the specific cases verified so far, the exposure of their bodies to self-mutilation in online transmissions on the Discord platform”, says an excerpt from the MP’s manifestation, made on the last month.
“These are crimes committed in a way that has never been seen before in this virtual environment. There is a lot of sadism and perversity in the material”, says promoter Danilo Pugliesi, who works on the task force. “A witness gained access to these groups and we are working to identify dozens of logins. There are at least 50 victims, but the number will grow, ”he summarized.
Ministry of Justice sees change in attitude
The discussions of bill 2630, known as the Fake News Bill, and the attacks on schools carried out in São Paulo and Santa Catarina made the Ministry of Justice increase its attention to digital platforms.
Many pressures and charges later, the assessment is that the problem still persists and the collaboration of the portals with the investigators still needs to improve – but some advances were noticeable in cases like Discord.
“We have a long way to go, but we have the indication that a collaboration between the platforms in meeting the Ministry’s demands is being made. In the case of Discord, we opened a conversation during the security operation at schools, and they are setting up a system to collaborate”, commented the coordinator of Digital Rights at the Ministry of Justice, Estela Aranha.
Discord reports having removed 12,000 users who would commit crimes on the platform
A CNN questioned Discord about complaints from the Public Ministry of São Paulo about the platform’s lack of collaboration with investigations.
In a statement, the app said it cannot comment on specific investigations, but is “committed to cooperating with law enforcement agencies in Brazil and committed to preventing harm.”
In six months, Discord reports having proactively removed 12,000 users who brought harmful material to Brazilian communities on the network. In addition, the platform reported that it gave crucial data to investigations that led to the arrest of individuals who prepared attacks on schools.
Source: CNN Brasil
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