Published in News

Ask.fm promises to clamp down on bullying

by on20 August 2013



String of suicides at the site

Social notworking site Ask.fm has promised to clamp down on bullying. The site was blasted by child safety campaigners after a string of suicides in Britain.

Hannah Smith, 14, hanged herself at her family's home after suffering months of bullying. She was the fourth teenage suicide in Britain linked to the website in the past year. Vodafone, Laura Ashley and the Save the Children charity, to withdrew advertising from the site. And Prime Minister David Cameron said Internet users should boycott "vile" websites that allow cyber bullying to avoid any more deaths.

The founders of Ask.fm, Russian brothers Ilja and Mark Terebin, said on Monday there had been a full audit of the website's safety features and that as a result, they would hire more staff to moderate comments, including a safety officer. They would also create a new function for users to report any bullying or harassment, and raise the visibility of a button to stop anonymous comments. Ask.fm has 70 million users.

Rate this item
(0 votes)