[Omah]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18415763

One of the biggest investors in popular children's online game Habbo has pulled out after concerns were raised about "explicitly sexual interactions".

Venture capital firm Balderton told the BBC it had decided to drop its stake in Habbo's owner, Sulake, last week.

A Channel 4 inquiry uncovered "very sexual, perverse, pornographic violent" chats taking place in the game.

Sulake said it was aware of the claims and was taking steps to protect children.

With some 10 million unique users per month, Habbo is one of the world's largest online communities for teenagers.

It is not the first time Habbo has been linked to inappropriate sexual allegations.

Last year paedophile Matthew Leonard, 21, of Billericay, Essex, was sentenced to seven years imprisonment after he admitted grooming young girls he had met in Habbo.

The game is set in a virtual hotel and, using avatars, players move from room to room, chat to other users and furnish their rooms using credits.

Posing as a young girl, a Channel 4 News producer said she had witnessed "very sexual, perverse, violent, pornographic" chats.

Rachel Seifert spent two months on Habbo and said after she took part in online chats, she had quickly found herself in the middle of conversations of extremely explicit sexual nature.

"Within two minutes I was being asked individually 'do you have a webcam?', 'can we chat on MSN, on Skype?'" she said.

"I was also within a couple of minutes asked to strip, fully naked, and asked what would I do on a webcam."

Ms Seifert said she had played the game 50 times, and every time had had similar experiences.

http://www.channel4.com/news/stripte...at-habbo-hotel

My first venture into the virtual online world of children started quite innocently. I expected bright colours, tinkly music, cartoon characters and fluffy animals. And when I first logged into the site of Habbo Hotel, that is pretty much what I got.

I created my cartoon child-like avatar as a little girl with shorts and T-shirt and a flower in her hair, and she wandered across brightly coloured rooms with teddy bears, flashing neon lights, pink ponies and fluttering butterflies.

But within minutes, lines of chat on speech bubbles rolled over the screen filled with pornographic chat. At first I couldn't quite believe my eyes, but it was there in black and white.

Read Channel 4 News' investigation into the alarming world of Habbo Hotel

These small avatars were literally having what I can only describe as cyber-sex. The juxtaposition of these explicitly sexual conversations against the backdrop of colourful balloons, talking rabbits and luminous rainbows was just shocking.

From that moment I was immersed into a whole new world of "cybering" (cyber sex). I had little cartoon boys coming up to me and saying they were feeling my boobs, following me to my bedroom and having sex with me, all without my permission or encouragement. At first it left me feeling slightly dirty and then pretty quickly, outraged.

This soon developed into these characters asking whether I would get naked on a webcam, or simply watch them masturbate. The requests were persistent and often forceful, making me feel pressured under the barrage.

And many of these requests came despite posing as an 11-year-old.

And this seemed to be the norm for the site. In fact, it felt to me that this was what people went there for.

The busiest rooms were named "sexy stripclub", "naughty nightclub", and so forth. Rooms which were full of rows of beds with cartoon children laying down ready for people to come and have sex with them, rooms which had "kissing booths" which shook while they were being used for cyber sex.

This was all graphically described in moving speech bubbles above.

I'd never heard of Habbo, but, since the allegations are obviously true, it should be shut down immedately and further investigation initiated !

[BBfanUSA]

I'm sorry, I'm looking at the title, I think I have a dirty mind

Anyway...do people realize how hard it is to stop stuff like this? And I don't think people haven't used Habbo in years thanks to Facebook

[Marc]

Habbo Hotel rocked I used to spend my parents' money on credits.

[King Gizzard]

BT use it for their adverts at the minute as well

[Doogle]

Habbo was crap because mum didn't have a credit card so I was a ****ing tramp on the game with all the basic clothes and everyone used to cyber bully me and call me ugly

[Marc]

Except that one guy who thought you looked cute and wanted to cam you xo

[Doogle]

**** off

[Smithy]

Originally Posted by big brother usa fan

I'm sorry, I'm looking at the title, I think I have a dirty mind

[2]

Originally Posted by Doogle

Habbo was crap because mum didn't have a credit card so I was a ****ing tramp on the game with all the basic clothes and everyone used to cyber bully me and call me ugly

Originally Posted by Marc

Except that one guy who thought you looked cute and wanted to cam you xo

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

this is not as bad as imvu i remember going in there with tommy and niall and there was people dressed as cats rolling around on the floor licking each other

[Doogle]

Originally Posted by Marc

think he was called conor..

May he burn in hell (or digital spy)

Originally Posted by Scott

this is not as bad as imvu i remember going in there with tommy and niall and there was people dressed as cats rolling around on the floor licking each other

oh my god

What did IMVU even mean? It sounds like "I envy you" when you say it out loud.

[Smithy]

Instant Messaging Virtual Universe

[Marc]

he knows everything.

[Doogle]

rofl im guessing it was made in the 1980s or something

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

it was really weird it was for adults though you had to be 18 to sign up iirc and there was loads of different rooms and like 390% of the rooms were those 'furry' people you know those people that wear fair suits and dress up as foxes and stuff to have sex AND OMFG i remember my name was foxylina because there was this meme at the time with this sassy black girl called foxylina and all of the furry people assumed i was one of them because of my username and i was like no please no

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

im gonna find that meme now to prove it

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

http://www.thisisbigbrother.com/foru...ht=meme&page=2

the pic is broken

[Shaun]

I remember I went on Omegle one time and some guy came out as a furry and I was like go away

[arista]

Yes Omah
Ch4News did a Top report on this
finding out the Paedos


Sign Of The Times

[Marc]

I must have missed the furry part of Habbo.

We used to just race for Furni

[Vicky.]

Haha I remember spending like 50 quid on my dads homephone buying credits on this game then getting grounded for it

[InOne]

I used to go on when I was like 14 or something. Never bought anything though

[arista]

Ch4News Live
has just reported Tesco and Game stores has stop selling their cards.

And 3i company has now left them.


All due to the Pervs and Paedos on the site.

[Niall]

Originally Posted by Scott

this is not as bad as imvu i remember going in there with tommy and niall and there was people dressed as cats rolling around on the floor licking each other

I remember that omfg that was fucking creepy. Hilarious, but still very creepy.

[Callum]

I used to love Habbo, went on it all the time. Had a couple of badges and lots of rare furni. I tried to log back in a while back though and my account had been deleted when all the English speaking Habbos merged.

[Saph]

I loved Habbo I joined in March 2006 :') Havent been on for ages. I always made sure I was a Habbo Club member otherwise you had crappy hairstyles :/