Mum warns parents after daughter, 11, was groomed on Spotify
As a strict parent of two and a primary school teacher that educates young children on internet safety, 'Rachel' thought she was one step ahead in protecting her children from the dark corners of the web.
She forbid the two of them to use social media apps like Instagram and Snapchat, but allowed her eldest to use Spotify to listen to music and podcasts.
So when she found out her eldest, 11, was being groomed on the streaming site by a secret grooming community, she felt as though the 'bottom of the world had fallen'.
Rachel, which is not her real name, was horrified and in shock to find that her daughter, still in primary school, had uploaded sexually explicit images at least ten times at the request of anonymous users on the site, claiming to also be young children - one at the age of 12.
Rachel says she allowed her children to have Spotify but not other apps because it doesn't have a chat function (Nikolas Kokovlis/NurPhoto/REX/Shutterstock)She found out what had been happening when Spotify emailed her to say the account had been disabled for violating their terms and conditions - and her daughter, in tears filled with guilt and shame, admitted it had been going on for months.
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The little girl, from Stockport, Greater Manchester, had been creating playlists about topics she was interested in, such as Minecraft, which then received followers, as first reported by the Manchester Evening News.
These followers were then able to edit the titles as a way of communicating, asking her to send explicit images.
Rachel says her daughter received multiple requests and exact instructions on what pictures to upload and felt pressured to conform.
The more times she uploaded images, as 'custom artwork', the more followers she gained - adding up to 327 - which made her feel good about herself and the cycle continued, her mum admits.
The grooming began just before the summer but Rachel only found out what was happening a few weeks ago, and immediately reported it to the police.
"You hear horror stories about predators using apps to groom so neither of them [her children] have Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat - I've kept them well away from them as much as I possibly can," Rachel told the Mirror.
"Because Spotify hasn't got any messaging function, I never even considered that.
"When I found out it was as if the bottom of the world fell away. At that moment, I think just shock, horror, but how?"
Her daughter explained one user repeatedly asked her for pictures to the point where she 'gave in'.
Another who she'd met on Spotify, claiming to be 12, emailed her asking for a graphic video of herself.
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One other asked her 'to put up one leg and hold it and show a good view' of her genitals.
A few more asked for a 'mirror picture with your legs spread' and for a 'tit pic'.
Her parents found there to be at least 12 accounts asking for this type of content.
With a search of certain keywords on Spotify, the Mirror found playlists with pornographic images.
Despite the young girl's account being removed, her content was still online, the mum says, and she claims she had to individually report each image - of which they found 10 - in order to get them deleted.
"She got more followers, it made her feel good, and then you're in the echo chamber, people saying nice things about her then more were requesting pictures and it kind of goes around in a cycle," Rachel explained on why she thinks her daughter did it, adding that she had never been directly told by an adult to not upload pictures to Spotify in particular.
"I've always been really open with them about why they're not allowed the other apps, people on there aren't very nice, they're not old enough.
"I work at a school so I know what the education is. And she thinks she followed the rules - 'I didn't tell them my name, where I lived.'
"On one hand I thought, 'yes you did follow the rules' but on the other hand I wanted to say 'how did you not see the link?'
"As a teacher myself, you don't want to use that language and say 'don't share sexually explicit content' at that age, for fear parents are going to come and complain about taking away that child's innocence or whatever it is."
Rachel says her daughter was terrified of telling the truth, but they assured her that it wasn't her fault from the get-go and have been regularly checking in on her.
The mum-of-two says the daughter has become more attached than usual, wanting more affection, and is now seeing a child psychologist every week to help build back her self-esteem.
They now fear how this might impact her future relationships.
The girl is now receiving therapy over the incident (Getty Images)"We've been so clear on that - you have made a mistake but everyone makes mistakes and this is not your fault," Rachel continued.
"She has taken a lot from the fact we are determined to turn it into a positive. She loves that people are talking about it, that the word is out there.
"She wants to stop this from happening to others. Showing her the power of taking her experiences and acting to help is really helpful for her to see."
Whether she will allow her back on Spotify, Rachel is undecided.
She wants the company, along with other tech giants, to do more to protect children.
And argues the Government needs to act to make sure the long-awaited Online Safety Bill, which was debated in UK Parliament on Tuesday, holds tech giants to account to protect children.
In the latest update, under the proposed changes, senior managers at tech firms will be criminally liable for repeated breaches of their duty of care to children and could face up to two years in jail.
In response to Rachel's story, Spotify said: "Spotify takes the safety of minors on our platform extremely seriously, and we do not allow content that promotes, solicits, or facilitates child sexual abuse or exploitation.
"We have processes and technology in place that allow us to detect and remove any such exploitative material."
While Rachel has felt grateful to Spotify for taking down her daughter's account, she's disappointed that it took uploading ten pictures before actually banning her as a user.
"Why did someone get away with breaching their guidelines ten times before being taken down?" Rachel probed.
"If they did it the first time she did it, we wouldn't be here now. We would have had the same conversation but it would not be to this extent.
"We know it's not just Spotify, there are predators in literally every corner of the internet who are going to do whatever they can to find the loopholes.
"We want companies to have, rather than a moral obligation, a legal obligation to act.
"These companies need to think about children first than profits first".
On Spotify's rule page, a sub-section titled 'sensitive content' says sexually explicit content is not allowed and that breaking the rules may result in result in the content being removed. Repeated or egregious violations may result in accounts being suspended or terminated, they say.
"Don't post excessively violent or graphic content, and don't post sexually explicit content," it states.
Spotify says sexually explicit content is not allowed (SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)"What to avoid: Content that contains sexually explicit material includes, but may not be limited to: pornography or visual depictions of genitalia or nudity presented for the purpose of sexual gratification, advocating or glorifying sexual themes related to rape, incest, or beastiality.
"Please respect Spotify, the owners of the Content, and other users of the Spotify Service. Don't engage in any activity, post any User Content, or register and/or use a username, which is or includes material that is offensive, abusive, defamatory, pornographic, threatening, or obscene."
Greater Manchester Police says an "investigation is underway" following the reports.
But although the possibility of the perpetrators never being caught frustrates Rachel, it makes her even more determined to call for change to stop it from happening to anyone else.
Rachel and her husband have petitioned their local MP Andrew Gwynne to raise the case in parliament.
Mr Gwynne told the Mirror: "I - as a suspect many others are - was unaware that groomers could manipulate platforms like Spotify to commit this kind of abuse. It raises really serious questions about what action Spotify will take to ensure this doesn't happen again, and what the Government will do to ensure that our children are kept safe online.
"I am particularly concerned at reports made by the family that they had to repeatedly complain before Spotify removed the material in question. That is just totally unacceptable, and I expect a full and frank explanation from Spotify on how this was allowed to happen.
"Moving forward, I want assurances from the Government that the Online Safety Bill is tough enough to address this kind of abuse. The internet is constantly evolving, and unless legislation evolves with it, I'm worried we'll see more cases like this."
The mum added: "Sadly there are always going to be predators out there.
"I'm determined to raise awareness to protect others.
"It can't just be our daughter."
Gabriella Russo, who is working with mum Rachel (Gabriella Russo)Rachel is working with Gabriella Russo, a safeguarding consultant with more than 25 years of experience, to get the word out to other parents and to help advise on what they can do if they find themselves in a similar situation.
Gabriella supplies training to schools and charities and was formerly a manager with the NSPCC. Like them, she had never come across youngsters being groomed in this way - but says predators are always one step ahead looking for loopholes.
Here, the expert outlines a number of warning signs to look for and advice for parents:
Steps to take
"In my experience of working in the field, any parent that discovers their child is being abused is going to have that heart-dropping fear - 'what exactly have they been put through? And what do we do?'" Gabriella began.
"Firstly, parents need to be aware of what apps their kids are on because they do have age restrictions and time and time again, I've gone into schools and talked about this and you always have kids go, 'but I'm allowed that one we use that anyway.’
"Parents need to not be afraid to be parents and put some rules in place.
"It's complicated and difficult because we don't want our children to be the odd one out. But we also need to be the parent or the carer in the situation.
"You can do this by making conversation about being online as normal and natural. For children, the online world is real, it's part of their life.
"And so actually, talking about that as much as any other part of their real life, is really important. Not just conversations about these rules, but learning about their online life as much as you can - pay an interest in what they're doing with their friends online, and don't be afraid to implement 'no phones in the bedroom at night' etc.
"And be prepared to say 'this is going to be out in the open, I can check it whenever, I can have your password' - obviously age appropriate.
"If you're gradually helping your children to navigate online safely then as they get older, they will be able to spot things themselves."
She added: "It's parenting in a different space.
"I think a lot of a lot of parents are concerned about reserving childhood innocence. 'I don't want to talk about too much too early,' but it's happening."
Gabriella adds that parents should have password access to their children's social media accounts and game apps during primary school age.
As children get older, the line is less clear-cut, but it depends on the maturity of the child and if they have special needs for example, she says.
"I think what's really important for children is to know that they can talk to an adult about anything they're unsure about," Gabriella continued.
"One of the things that can be done is helping children identify who the adults are that they would talk to.
"That could be a conversation where, 'if anything was ever worrying you, who would you talk to if you didn't want to talk to me as your mum or your dad, who are the other adults around you?'
"We want our children to talk to us, but I'd rather a child speak to another adult for help than nobody. And if you're a parent, if you're not the first port of call, sometimes that's natural."
Warning signs
"If it doesn't feel right. It's probably not" (PA)"I would definitely be concerned about a child making friends online with anyone I didn't know offline," Gabriella warned.
"You can make amazing friendships online as an adult, but can they be sure that they are who they say they are?
"Anything where they're being encouraged to do something that doesn't sit right with them - anything where they've been encouraged to join something that they know they wouldn't be allowed to by their parents.
"Or, anything where they're being asked to send something that's going to be kept confidential, or secret, anything around keeping secrets, because if you have to keep it as a secret, what's that about? But also, nothing online is guaranteed secret.
"Do the kids have a real understanding of healthy relationships - what's a good interaction? There'll be more alert later on, but also help them to really understand that and trust their own instincts as well.
"If it doesn't feel right. It's probably not. And even if you're wrong, the world's not going to fall apart if you don't participate because you can join in next time if it wasn't."
Gabriella says if parents find themselves in this situation, it's important not to let emotions get the better of them.
"The initial response is so important because they will open up more," she added.
The expert urges everyone to report incidents to the police, alert the school where the child attends, and then seek therapeutic support.
"These groomers and paedophiles will find another corner that hasn't been exploited yet. They're going to be steps ahead," Gabriella said.
"So we just have to do our very best and being aware all of those foundations, hopefully, a child will be like 'well hang on, this doesn't feel right."
If you have information on child exploitation and abuse or suspect it may be happening but want to remain completely anonymous, you can contact the independent charity Crimestoppers online or on the phone. You can also call the NSPCC on 0808 800 5000 if you're concerned about a child.
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