Kik has become ‘the defacto app’ for child predators, according to an investigative report
An investigative report claims that Kik Messenger, an instant messaging app popular with children and teenagers, has become “the defacto app for grooming children online,” in part due to its ease of access to minors.
Kik Messenger is a free instant messaging service from Kik Interactive, a Canadian tech firm founded in 2009. Since then, it has gained over 300 million users and reaches 40 percent of teenagers in the United States. The report is a collaboration between British investigative media company Point and Forbes, which found that predators quickly move to contact and groom under-age users on the service, aided by third-party apps that help share profiles.
Point and Forbes found that Kik is frequently cited by law enforcement as...