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Gaming

BEWARE: Kindle Fire Free Porn Apps For Children

20 replies

Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 10:34

I just really wanted to bring awareness to any parents out there who let there children have access to the Kindle Fire products. I bought two for my children only to discover that in the App Store under Entertainment, right next to apps that children would be drawn to (ie, The Snowman, WWF etc) were FREE porn apps - I could not believe that on a product marketed at families, my children were one click away from accessing free porn. I applied parental restrictions but the apps were still visible. The only way to delete these apps is to delete the whole App Store from the device.

I contacted Amazon and they basically tried to say it must be a bad batch and that they had not come across this before. I returned the products but felt very concerned that the company were not bothered by this, even though David Cameron has pledged to make it harder for children to access porn on the Internet. Here is a household name company making it FREELY available in an App Store.

However, last week when visiting a friend, she happened to mention that her son had got a Kindle Fire for his birthday and I asked if I could check out the App Store as explained that I had bought two from a 'dodgy batch'. But my friend and I were both shocked to see at last 7 Free Porn apps in the entertainment section such as HOt India Babes/ Espanol Sex/ SEx positions etc. my friend clicked on one to see what would happen if her son had done the same and it opened up graphic porn pictures with links to more hardcore porn sites.

IS THIS ACCEPTABLE AMAZON???
No one seems to be taking this seriously or interested at all and I cannot believe I am the only parent outraged by this disgusting disregard for our children.
I have contactd watchdog, The Daily Mail and The Guardian and none of the reporters have responded. Are they in Amazons pocket?
I am turning to you lovely mums out there to let you know so that you can check your Kindle Fires for these apps and please if you find them on there and think like me, please let me know so we can get this to public attention.
Thank you!

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BertieBotts · 10/02/2013 10:49

How could it be a "dodgy batch" Hmm if the apps are appearing in the marketplace itself which is nothing to do with the kindle itself. Unless the "dodgy batch" part was about the parental controls not working - but again this would be a software issue and easily fixed with a software update.

However I agree with you that it is a problem - I use android, and adult apps do not appear in the "top" lists, I don't use parental controls as it's my own phone. If you search adult keywords like "sex" then adult apps will come up, but they aren't easy to come across by accident.

However, the ads can occasionally be inappropriate on android - I downloaded a bubble bobble type game to my android phone and while the game itself is very suitable for children and adults, the adverts are awful on it - I keep seeing one which says something like "Would you sleep with a virgin?" or "Do you think she's good in bed?" with a naked woman on the ad. DS keeps seeing me playing the game and asks me to download it, as I let him play some games on my old android phone, but I don't really want him seeing the ads! Most of the games I've downloaded which are aimed specifically at children however, are fine and just have ads for other apps or more neutral things.

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difficultpickle · 10/02/2013 10:53

Thanks for the warning. I have a Kindle Fire and ds plays with it but doesn't go to the App store. I had thought of getting him his own but I won't be doing that now. I've not had a problem with adult apps on my iphone, in fact I can't recall seeing any at all and I don't have any parental controls on that.

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Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 10:57

The ads sound horrible! But like you say, on most devices, adult apps have to be specifically searched for.
I have an iPad myself and have never come across anything like it in any of the App sections. I just find it really strange that such a big company like Amazon would allow this to happen.

Thank you for your reply - be really interesting to see if anyone else who has a Kindle Fire can do a quick check and see if they have the apps?

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Startail · 10/02/2013 11:14

Can't see anything dodgy on the front page of the ap store today.

I think I might have one vaguely off advert in ap advert, but I cancel them on auto pilot.

The ones that wind me up are video ads on the PC while free online games are loading.
Very violent shoot ups before bubbles and other totally non adult games on sites that, pre easy video streaming were totally child friendly.

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BertieBotts · 10/02/2013 11:16

Oh yeah and you can't leave reviews on android apps now without having a google+ account which I don't want to sign up for! So this is very annoying IMO.

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BertieBotts · 10/02/2013 11:17

But at least you can install adblocker on a PC - no such thing as far as I know for phones. And if adult apps are appearing in the amazon app store then this is not good.

Although worth bearing in mind that DC can access all sorts if you give them free rein on any electronic device which can access the internet.

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DifferentNow · 10/02/2013 11:18

We bought DD age 11 a Kindle Fire for Xmas. A few weeks ago, I decided to remove my credit card details from Amazon in case she purchased something by mistake as it's so easy to do with the one-click thing. Signing in brought up a list of all the free apps she'd 'purchased' and included was a 'sex dice' one and a 'sex positions' one. We were pretty horrified to be honest and have since had a frank discussion with her about what is and isn't appropriate. I have an iPhone so I downloaded the same apps to see what the content was and it was awful. Now she knows that I can see what she's been downloading but she also has a basic smartphone and as these apps are free and accessible to anyone from the marketplace, I don't know how else to protect her from it, other than completely withdrawing her access.

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difficultpickle · 10/02/2013 11:24

You can certainly set parental controls on an iphone, ipod etc. I did with ds's ipod. If your dd chooses to override those then personally I would withdraw her access. I would certainly be doing that if ds did similar at that age.

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difficultpickle · 10/02/2013 11:26

Here is info for setting parental controls on the Kindle Fire. Like the iphone etc you can pick and choose the level of control you set.

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Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 11:31

I just find this really disturbing - if Apple can produce products that are fairly safe for children, in that the 'adult apps' are not freely available in amongst apps for children, then why is Amazon letting them be so freely marketed and available? We saw that sex dice/position one on my friends Kindle and the thing is, your daughter may have just been curious as they are there and free, but clicking on them opens up things she just may not be ready to deal with. It just is not right at all for Amazon to be marketing those to families as a cheaper alternative to the iPad without being able to ensure these apps are not visible unless specifically searched for. The icons themselves are pornographic and when you see them sitting next to an app for something innocent and unrelated, it is shocking.
I really would have expected better from a company like this.
Sorry for ranting!

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Startail · 10/02/2013 11:34

If you type sex on a fire or a iPhone you get loads, and any 6 year old can spell that, but you can't down load them unless you know the iTunes/kindle password (set password for purchases in parental controls on the kindle)

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BertieBotts · 10/02/2013 11:36

That is a good balance - setting a password and approving apps before they download them. However, not really appropriate for a young teenager?

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Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 11:37

Kindle fire parental controls do not stop the porn apps appearing - I went through all of them whilst on phone to Amazon. The only way is to block the whole App Store. And my point is, many people will not realise that these apps are so freely available. I certainly would never have thought to check - it was only because I wanted to set them up with bbc iplayer before I gave them as presents, that I discovered all the porn in the entertainment store. Surely it should be Amazons responsibility to make these products as safe as possible, like apple have managed to do.

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edam · 10/02/2013 11:38

I've set the parental controls on my Kindle Fire. You should set parental controls on any electronic device you own (computer, phone, tablet, gaming device such as playstation that connects to internet) that can be accessed by a child. Have never seen any porn coming up accidentally - dunno whether that's because setting parental controls was the first thing I did.

Dodgy batch thing is nonsense as has been explained upthread.

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Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 11:42

Also, I just typed 'sex' into my iPad App Store and nothing came up that was anywhere near as visually disturbing as what is available on the Kindle Fire for free . Of course there will always be children who are tempted to type in naughty words but they should be protected from viewing explicit images when they are simply looking for an innocent play app such as on the amazon kindle.

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difficultpickle · 10/02/2013 11:42

Then they need to set a restriction for apps like Apple do - which you can set for age.

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Lilypie10 · 10/02/2013 11:43

Maybe have a look under Entertainment in the App Store and just scroll down a few rows. Be interested to see if they are on there!

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Startail · 10/02/2013 12:43

You can't down load free stuff on a fire if you set password for purchases I agree there are a few dodgy example screen shots in the amazon store.

On the iPhone nothing dodgy seems to be shown until you hit down load, the screen shots are very tame.

Android have always made it clear they aren't going to be as strict as "the big apple is watching you" .

Anyway you only need the daily fail if you want soft porn.

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edam · 10/02/2013 13:02

I just had a look at the app store on my kindle and can't see anything pornographic "right next to apps that children would be drawn to (ie, The Snowman, WWF etc)".

I have my reservations about Amazon over taxation and employment practices but really can't see what they've done wrong here.

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difficultpickle · 10/02/2013 14:28

Have had a good look at the App Store of my KF and can't find anything pornographic at all.

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