The United Arab Emirates’ Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) warned against the chat features implemented in computer games. They warned that criminal groups could infiltrate said chats and spread “damaging ideologies.”
In a statement issued on Saturday, the TRA warned parents and young people to be vigilant when using chat forums on computer games and other electronic forums. As teenagers often spend long periods of time alone in their rooms playing computer games, they are susceptible to dangerous conversations with dangerous individuals which may encourage them to engage in dangerous actions.
The report also claimed that: “Criminal groups propagating radical ideologies may exploit chat features across electronic games, spreading violent ideas and encouraging rebellious actions. By manipulating their emotions and influencing their minds through messages and conversations, young people are susceptible to exploitation and could be led down the wrong path.”
Mohammed Al Zarooni, director of the policy and programs department at the TRA, also said that: “The groups that adopt such vicious thinking are trying to recruit young people and adolescents through some electronic games, starting with unusual conversations with them in such a way that it reveals their weaknesses so they can be easily exploited and instructed to commit unlawful acts.”
Now while this could be something that could happen, it mostly sounds like concerned parents banter. The chances that a terrorist organization or something of the like would try to get kids to do terrorist acts via online games is not very possible. In this day and age, kids who have gamed for quite a while, know better than to do something someone in World of Warcraft tells them to. This would be a viable scenario back in like 1998 when multiplayer gaming was still a fairly new concept. Nowadays, however, gamers are more self-aware of the world around them and something like this has a low if any chance of happening.
