The reason teenagers are stealing your kids' photos and trying to pass them off as their own.

By HOLLY WAINWRIGHT

So here’s something I wasn’t worrying about when I uploaded that really cute picture of my really cute kids on Saturday:

Somebody stealing the picture of my child, pretending they were their’s, and using it in a complex role-playing game where they invent what my baby might say or do.

Baby Role-Playing is the new thing sent to freak parents out about online safety.

Role players build fake families, and interact with each other in the voice of the imaginary children.

What does it look like? This:

That baby does not belong to adoptionrp. But the user has taken the pics and used them as their own pretend baby to play along in family role play.

So one commenter says, “You’re so adorable.” And Mystery Baby answers back, “Tank ooo.”

Creepy? A little. Sad? Definitely.

Why would anyone take photos of stranger’s children and pretend they were their own? A post on Fast Company, a technology site, explored the phenomena, and found that as far as it was possible to tell, most of the players were teenagers, often from an unhappy family environment.

FC spoke to psychiatrist Gail Saltz, who said:

 “It’s more exciting to be testing these fantasies online and not in their minds because there’s some follow through online and yet they’re behind the safety of their computer in their bedroom. This is another variation of that. These role players have a desire to try on the fantasy of being a family person, a mother, whatever it might be that they’re searching for or void they’re trying to fill.”

But some of the comments on these feeds take a far more sinister tone, with the “baby” posting messages about nudity and breastfeeding that have a distinctly abusive edge.

When one US mother found this had happened to her child, she started getting strange messages to her Instagram account, and contacted the administrators. She told Fast Company, “I explained that this private user had stolen photos of my infant daughter. Their response was that this was impersonation of a minor and I should be reporting that a minor is using Instagram. I wrote back and said this is not a minor using Instagram. She claims she’s 14 and she’s using a picture of my baby and other babies. They never responded.”

A petition on Change.org didn’t attract many signatures.

Another group who are likely to build fantasy families are parents who are desperate for children of their own, and some sites, like BabyNames.com have actually created forums where players can do this, but within strict guidelines that include no stolen photos. There the players can reinvent themselves as a mother of three, post pics of their dream nurseries, baby clothes and houses, and discuss their child’s personalities and development as if they were real.

Parents love Instagram. And we love Facebook. We expend an enormous amount of effort, time, tears and love on our kids, and sometimes we just want to show them off. Or update our family and friends about their progress. Or just represent the reality of lives that feature children front and centre.

But savvy parents are wary of sharing too much – we know that swimmers are essential, there’s a strict no-bathtime rule, and that overposting of their heart-aching cuteness is going to annoy just about everyone.

And now we have something new to be worried about. Argh.