Omegle, BeReal, Discord and Twitch: A complete guide to where your teens spend time online.

Australian parents were left horrified last week as Todd Sampson's Mirror Mirror documentary exposed Omegle - a free platform popular with teens - as a forum for grooming and predation. 

The shock not only related to the creepy nature of the website, but the fact that Gen Z users knew all about Omegle, while their millennial and Gen X parents had never heard of it.

After making the documentary, Sampson went home to tell his young teens about the dangers of Omegle. But it was too late.

Watch a clip from Mirror Mirror below. Post continues after video.

"I wanted to warn them to say, 'Don't go on this site, it's filled with paedophiles and criminal activity' and they looked at the ground and said, 'Dadda, we've been on that site for years. Everyone is on it at school.'"

To support our Mamamia community and parents of teens and pre-teens, we thought we would look more closely at not only Omegle, but all the other places your teens and pre-teens spend time online.

Omegle.

Omegle promotes itself as a free platform where you can "meet great new friends" on the internet. The website, originally launched in 2009, enables users to either message or video chat complete strangers, with users randomly paired with another person online to communicate one-on-one.

It pulls in millions and millions of users across the globe each week and it makes money from advertising and affiliate marketing that mostly sends users to adult webcam services.

With a video chat option that requires no sign in or sign up, it's easy to see why it attracts predators. 

A lawsuit is underway at the moment in the US where an American man was convicted of abusing an underage girl via Omegle. In 2014, the then 30-something-year-old man was paired with the then 11-year-old girl, where he proceeded to sextort her. He forced her to send naked photos and videos of herself engaging in sexual acts, according to the lawsuit. 

The man was then criminally charged in 2018 for his actions. He pleaded guilty to internet luring and distribution of child pornography and was sentenced to prison.  

In Australia, Omegle remains available to use. However, it's listed on the eSafety Commissioner website with a warning sign stating: "Users may encounter sexualised content and inappropriate behaviour anywhere on the site. Omegle does not verify the age of users."

Listen: On this episode of The Quicky, host Claire Murphy talks to cyber safety expert Kirra Pendergast about Omegle. Post continues below. 

BeReal.

BeReal is a 'once-a-day' photo sharing app designed to show a 'real' insight into its users' lives. BeReal has no filter options and you can't edit the photo once it's uploaded. 

CEO of Safe on Social Media, Kirra Pendergast, told The Quicky that while BeReal sounds better than some of the other social media apps, the comment options and the fact you can only delete one photo per day means bullying on the app is still rife.

"You can still take screenshots of images using another device and users are taking photos anywhere, such as in the supermarket or in the classroom, and people don't know they're being photographed," Pendergast says.

"It's gotten very invasive and very full-on pretty quickly."

Sendit.

A mix of games, challenges, and messaging, the Sendit app is new to the social media scene. Users can send each other challenges or questions and 'friends' respond directly to the story.

According to Pendergast, the issue with Sendit is that it is "completely anonymous", meaning there's a lot of room for nasty messages from random people commenting on kids' photos and their physical appearance.

One review on Common Sense Media is particularly scathing:

"Horrible app. It's being exploited by bullies to say horrible things to other kids anonymously. Then charging kids to find out who is saying those horrible things!"

Discord.

Discord is a voice and text chatting tool predominantly used by gamers. If your teen loves Fortnite, there's a high chance they also use Discord to connect with other fans of the game.

As Discord was not created with kids in mind, users can send direct messages to each other, so there is the potential for interactions with strangers. According to a review on Family Zone, the 'easy to use' functionality of Discord is a worry for parents.

"Profanity and abusive language are standard on many Discord gaming servers.

"What’s more, many players are discussing 'mature' games - think sex, violence, and drugs - and these themes will often feature in conversations."

The other worrying problem for Discord and its users is how hate groups have become prolific on the service due to the ability to chat anonymously.

The advice from Family Zone for parents of older teens who use Discord is to communicate with your teen about why and how they use the app. Set up the Explicit Content Filter and regularly check in with them to see how they are doing.

Listen to Mamamia's podcast for parents of teens, Help! I Have A Teenager. Post continues below.

TikTok.

TikTok is one of the fastest growing social media platforms in the world, especially for the 10-29 year old demographic. It allows users to create short videos with music, filters, and special effects, and with one billion active users worldwide, it's pretty clear people love it.

TikTok does offer some tools for parents to limit how much time kids spend on the app and what kids can see. Parents can also use Restricted Mode to reduce mature content or Family Safety Mode to pair their account with their kids to control settings completely.

Snapchat.

According to the App Store, Snapchat is the fast and fun way to share the moment with your friends and family. There are filters and fun features galore, live chat, group video chat, and location sharing services. 

It's a popular app with 347 million daily users, but many parents worry about the many reported incidents of bullying on Snapchat. 

Christine Elgersma writing for Common Sense Media says the most challenging aspect for parents is not being able to monitor their kids' activities like you can on Instagram, since there isn't a feed to scroll through and the photo 'snaps' disappear after being sent or received.

"If you decide to say yes to Snapchat, focus on the privacy settings," Elgersma says.

"Sit down with your kid and go into the app's settings together. This is where you can control important safety features such as who can see your location and who can view your story."

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Twitch.

Twitch is mostly used by gamers to watch live streams of the games they love while chatting to other gamers. 

According to Common Sense Media, Twitch makes a "concerted effort to keep sexual content from being shared by putting temporary or permanent bans on users who break these rules". 

But even with these standards, kids may encounter bad language, games that feature excessive violence, and mature age content.  

Roblox.

Mostly used by a younger pre-teen demographic, Roblox can appear to be a strictly creative multiplayer game similar to Minecraft. But with user-generated content, kids can be exposed to all sorts of unregulated content.

And with the ability to chat online, there is potential for concerning, predatory behavior and sexually explicit user forums.

Fortnite.

Fortnite is a hugely popular free online video game first released in 2017. While there is a bit of shooting and violence, it is cartoon-like and not overly graphic. The main concern for parents is the highly addictive nature of the game, expensive in-game purchases, and cyber safety issues.

In the Mirror Mirror documentary, Todd Sampson speaks to a dad whose son was groomed on Fortnite.

Ryan*, the father of a 12-year-old boy, appeared on the show to tell his story, sharing how his son was the victim of online abuse.

The young boy, who said he often spent 10 to 15 hours a day playing Fortnite, was exposed to a predator via the chat function in the game, who went on to solicit pictures from him.

"At some point, it migrated from talking on Fortnite to being told to download WhatsApp on his phone," Ryan explained to Sampson. 

"So he downloaded WhatsApp and then saved this person's number as BFF, which is 'best friend forever,'" he continued.

"I grabbed the phone and went into his messages and I was mortified at what I found. They asked for pictures in return for $300 worth of Xbox vouchers, which he didn't even think twice about. He just provided it to them."

You can watch Todd Sampson's Mirror, Mirror documentary on TenPlay now.

For more information on cyber safety for kids, visit the Safe on Social website or Facebook page.

To learn more about the apps and games listed in this article, as well as many other's used by kids and teens in Australia, visit the eSafety Guide website.

Laura Jackel is Mamamia's Family Writer. For links to her articles and to see photos of her outfits and kids, follow her on Instagram and  TikTok.

Feature Image: Instagram/Omegle.